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Mk^SRiaJjL51 



Sixty-Fourth Congress, First Session 



Senate Document No. 425 



STATUE OF 

HENRY MOWER RICE 

ERECTED IN STATUARY HALL OF 
THE UNITED STATES CAPITOL 
BY THE STATE OF MINNESOTA 



PROCEEDINGS IN STATUARY HALL, IN 
THE SENATE, AND IN THE HOUSE OF 
REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED 
STATES UPON THE UNVEILING, RE- 
CEPTION, AND ACCEPTANCE OF THE 
STATUE OF HENRY MOWER RICE 
FROM THE STATE OF MINNESOTA 



feixtg-SImtrtli (Baasttsa 



Compiled uoder the direction o£ the 
Joint Committee on Printing 



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-/ (p^S 7 



WASHINGTON 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 

1916 



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AUTHORITi" TO PRINT 

SENATE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION NO. i6, SIXTY-FOURTH 

CONGRESS 

Resolved by the Senate {the House of Representatives concurring). That there 
be printed and bound, under the direction of the Joint Committee on Printing, 
the proceedings in Congress, together with the proceedings at the unveiling ia 
Statuary Hall, upon the acceptance of the statue of Henry Mower Rice 
presented by the State of Minnesota, sixteen thousand five htmdred copies, 
with suitable illustration, of which five thousand shall be for tlie use of the 
Senate and ten thousand for the use of the House of Representatives, and 
the remaining one thousand five hundred copies shall be for the use and dis- 
tribution of the Senators and Representatives in Congress from the State of 
Minnesota. 

Passed the Senate March i6, 1916. 

Passed the House April 8, 1916. 



D. of D. 
JAN 19 1917 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



Proceedings in Statuary Hall: Page 
Prayer by Rev. James Shera Montgomery, pastor of Metropolitan 

Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church, Washington, D. C 7 

Remarks by the presiding officer, Mr. Frederick G. Ingeisoll 8 

Unveiling of statue by Miss Matilda Whitall Auerbach 9 

Placing of D. A. R. wreath at foot of statue by Mrs. Charles R. 

Davis 9 

Addresses by — 

Hon. Knute Nelson, United States Senator from Minnesota. , . 11 

Hon. Moses E. Clapp, United States Senator from Minnesota. . 19 

Hon. Thomas R. Marshall, Vice President of the United States. 21 

Benediction by Rev. James Shera Montgomery 24 

Proceedings in the Senate: 
Addresses by — 

Mr. Knute Nelson, of Minnesota 29 

Mr. Oscar W. Underivood , of Alabama 32 

Mr. Warren G. Harding, of Ohio 35 

Mr. Jacob H. Gallinger, of New Hampshire 38 

Mr. Moses E. Clapp, of Minnesota 41 

Proceedings in the House: 

Prayer by Rev. Henry N. Couden, D. D 48 

Addresses by — 

Mr. Charles R. Davis, of Minnesota 49 

Mr. Halvor Steenerson, of Minnesota 53 

Mr. Clarence B. Miller, of Minnesota 57 

Mr. Andrew J. Volstead, of Minnesota 61 

Mr. George R. Smith, of Minnesota 65 

Mr. Charles A. Lindbergh, of Minnesota 73 

Mr. Carl C. Van Dyke, of Mirmesota 76 

Mr. Thomas D. Schall, of Minnesota 82 

Mr. Sydney Anderson, of Minnesota 84 

Mr. Franklin P. Ellsworth, of Minnesota 86 

3 



THE SCULPTOR 
Frederick E. Triebel 

COLLEGE POINT, LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK CITY 

Born in Peoria, 111., December 29, 1865. Studied art in 
the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, Florence, Italy, from 
which he graduated in 1888, receiving first prize and a 
silver medal for the excellence of his work. The Italian 
Government purchased his graduating study. Received 
Galilee silver medal from Museo Nazionale di Antropologia, 
Florence, Italy, in 1889 and 1891. Presented with medal 
of science by Pope Pius X in 191 2. Selected by Germany 
as a member of the jury of awards at World's Columbian 
Exposition. Elected professor of sculpture, Royal Roman 
Academy of Fine Arts, 1898. Elected academician of merit 
for sculpture by the Royal Fine Arts Academy of San Luca, 
Rome, Italy, in 1905. Among his works are Mysterious 
Music, exhibited at World's Columbian Exposition, 1893, 
and purchased by the Japanese Government for the Imperial 
Museum at Tokyo, Japan; Defense of the Flag, a soldier's 
monument erected at Peoria, 111.; the statue of Robert G. 
Ingersoll at Peoria, 111. ; the monument erected by tlie State 
of Iowa on the Shiloh battlefield; tlie monument erected 
by tlie State of Mississippi on the battlefield at Vicksburg; 
the Senator George L. Shoup statue in the Hall of Fame, 
Washington, D. C; statues of President Diaz, of Mexico; 
Gen. John A. Logan; Tobias Bradley; Olegario Molina, 
Governor of Yucatan; Ellen Marion Clizbe Don Meyer 
memorial, Peoria, 111; Marble Group, Mrs. J. B. Greenhut, 
Shadow Lawn, Long Branch, New Jersey; and many other 
works of conspicuous merit. 
4 



UNVEILING OF 

STATUE OF 

HENRY MOWER RICE 



STATUARY HALL 
FEBRUARY 8, 1916 



PROGRAM 

STATUARY HALL, FEBRUARY 8, 1916 



Mr. Frbdsrick G. Ingersoll, of Minnesota, Presiding 

Invocation Rev. James Shera Montgomery, of Washington 

Unveiling of tlie statue Miss Matuda W. Auerb ach 

Presentation by the commission Hon. Knutb Nelson 

Presentation by the State of Minnesota Hon. MosES E. Clapp 

Acceptance for the United States Hon. Thomas R. Marshaia 



THE RICE STATUE COMMISSION 

AUTBORIZSD BY THB MDWJBSOTA I.EGISI.ATUHE OP I9I3 AND APPOINTSD 
BY GOV. A. O. BBBRHARD IN I9IJ 

Knute Nelson, Chairman 

Frederick G. Ingersoll, Secretary 

Maurice Auerbach (deceased) 

Mrs. Matilda Rice Auerbach 

Prof. F. E. Triebel, Sculptor 

6 




f:if,'tt.Si)ffvn 



STATUE OF HENRY MOWER RICE 

STATUARY HALL, UNITED STATES CAPITOL 
WASHINGTON, D. C, FEBRUARY 8, 1916, 11 A. M. 



The Presiding Officer (Mr. Frederick G. Ingersoll). 
Mr. Vice President, ladies, and gentlemen, the Legislature 
of the State of Minnesota, at its session in 1913, provided 
for the appointment of a commission to secm-e the erection, 
in this Hall, of a statue of one of its most distinguished 
citizens— Henry Mower Rice. The completed statue is 
here for unveiling and installation, and it is with a great 
deal of satisfaction that we welcome the friends of Mr. 
Rice here to-day in such large numbers. Rev. James 
Shera Montgomery, of the Metropolitan Memorial Methodist 
Episcopal Church of this city, for many years a resident of 
Minnesota, will invoke the divine blessing. 

invocation 

Dr. Montgomery. Almighty God, our heavenly Father, 
we lift our minds this moment unto Thy holy mount, from 
whence cometh our help; our help cometh from the Lord. 
Our lips are filled with praise this morning because our 
hearts are filled with gratitude. We recognize, Almighty 
God, in Thee we live and have our being. We bless Thy 
holy name for the inheritances of the past and for the 
wisdom, chivalry, and courage of our fathers. 

O God, may thy blessings, in some measure, fall upon us. 
Bless our great country that we love and grant that every 
section of this great Republic may recognize always the 
forefathers of our great civilization of every State. O God, 
in this sisterhood of States, and at this moment more espe- 
cially, look with divine and great favor upon the great 

7 



8 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

Commonwealth of Minnesota. Regard us as a nation, O 
God of mercy and wisdom. Direct in great wisdom the 
President of these United States; also the legislative and 
judicial departments of this great Government. 

We pray also for the peace of the troubled world. O 
Prince of Peace, harbinger of a higher and greater life, heal 
Thou the open sore of troubled Europe, and may the Prince 
of Peace come in the fulfillment of His blessed promise 
"Peace on earth, good will toward men." 

We make this petition, O God, as Thou art our Father, 
and Jesus Christ is our leader and brother, that Thou will 
hear us when we call. Amen and amen. 

The Presiding Officer. It was in 1864 that the Presi- 
dent of the United States was authorized by Congress to 
invite every State of the Union to provide statues of two 
of its citizens, illustrious for distinguished civic or military 
services, and to place the same in the Nation's Capitol. In 
1899 the Legislature of the State of Minnesota, taking advan- 
tage of this opportunity, designated Henry Mower Rice, 
one of the first Senators from that State, as one of the two 
to occupy a place in this Hall of Fame. In 191 3 the legis- 
lature appropriated the money for the erection of this 
statue and provided for the appointment of this commission. 
Gov. Eberhart made the appointments without delay and 
the commission at once proceeded to carry out the wishes 
of the legislature. Mr. Maurice Auerbach, for many years 
a resident of Minnesota, was one of the original members of 
that commission, and upon his death, in November last, 
Mrs. Auerbach was appointed to succeed him. Hon. Knute 
Nelson and myself constitute the other members. 

Before proceeding further let me pay tribute to the valu- 
able aid rendered by Mr. Auerbach while a member of this 
commission. Undertakings of this kind are not brought to 
completion without careful attention and labor, and Mr. 
Auerbach gave willingly, generously, and intelligently of 
both. The other members of the commission are under 
great obligations to him. His death deprived us not only 



Unveiling of the Statue. 



of his assistance and excellent judgment, at a time when it 
was needed, but inflicted upon us a personal loss, and finds 
us here to-day imder a keen sense of disappointment because 
of his absence. 

This statue which we are about to unveil is the work of 
Prof. F. E. Triebel, of College Point, Long Island, a member 
of the Royal Academy of San Luca of Rome, Italy, who 
was selected in competition with a large number of other 
artists, and we feel gratified at the high order of talent and 
abihty that he has displayed and with the work which he 
has produced. 

We are all anxious to see the statue. Miss Matilda 
Whitall Auerbach, a granddaughter of Mr. RicE, has kindly 
consented to unveil it for us. 

[Unveiling of statue by Miss Auerbach. Applause.] 

This statue is of the purest Italian statuary marble, seven 
feet in height, upon a pedestal of gray marble of three feet 
six inches, upon a base of four and one-half inches, beauti- 
fully proportioned, and comparing favorably with other 
statues about us. Upon the lapel of the coat appears the 
insignia of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion, of which 
Mr. Rice was a companion of the third order and rank in the 
Minnesota Commandery. To this rank are eHgible those 
who, in civil life, during the Rebellion were especially distin- 
guished for conspicuous and consistent loyalty to the 
National Government and were active and eminent in 
maintaining its supremacy. On the pedestal is the inscrip- 
tion: "Henry Mower Rice, i8i 7-1894" (the years of his 
birth and death) and the words "United States Senator, 
Minnesota." 

The Daughters of the American Revolution of Minnesota 
have, in recognition of this event, sent a beautiful wreath 
to be placed at the foot of this statue by the regent of 
Minnesota, Mrs. Charles R. Davis, who will now make the 
presentation. 

Mrs. Davis. I must correct you, Mr. Chairman. I am not 
the regent of Minnesota. Mrs. George C. Squires, of St. 



lo Staiu£ of Henry Mower Rice 

Paul, is the regent of Minnesota. But I have the honor of 
representing the Daughters of the American Revolution of 
Minnesota here to-day, and it is a great pleasure to place 
this wreath upon this statue in expression of the highest 
tribute they feel, not only toward Mr. RicE, but toward Mrs. 
Auerbach, a daughter of Mr. Rice; and a member of our 
society. [Applause.] 
[Placing of wreath at fcxjt of statue by Mrs. Davis.] 

The Presiding Officer. It was in May, 1858, immedi- 
ately upon the organization of the State of Minnesota, that 
the legislature of that State selected Mr. RicE as one of its 
first Senators. Mr. RicE came to the Senate of the United 
States at perhaps the most trying period in the history' of 
our Government and served throughout the period of the 
Civil War. He had an opportunity to render, and did 
render, to the State and Nation most valuable services. 
You will, I am sure, be very much interested in hearing what 
Mr. Rice accomplished, what he stood for, and what he did, 
not only in the Senate of the United States but throughout 
his life, as a loyal citizen of Minnesota. It affords me 
especial pride to introduce Hon. Knute Nelson, senior 
Senator from the Statie of Minnesota, the honored and re- 
spected chairman of this commission, who will present the 
statue, in the name of the commission, to the State of 
Minnesota. 



ADDRESS OF SENATOR NELSON OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Vice President, ladies and gentlemen, 
during the centtuy which elapsed from the time Radisson 
and Duluth first visited Minnesota until France relinquished 
her sovereignty and title to Great Britain of the territory 
east of the Mississippi River, in 1763, Minnesota remained 
an unexplored wilderness, visited only at long intervals by 
a few missionaries and fur traders, who made no settlements 
and who, because of the transitory character of their visits, 
secured but scant knowledge of the character of the country. 
And while nominally under English and Spanish rule, from 
then until the end of the eighteenth century little progress 
was made in settlement or exploration. A few missionaries 
and a few fur traders were the only white occupants of this 
vast domain. English law was technically paramoimt east 
of the Mississippi, and Spanish law west of the Mississippi. 
It was not until the English had abandoned their posts in 
the Northwest Territory and France had ceded Louisiana 
that the Federal Government proceeded to explore and 
take an inventory of and occupy its great possessions in the 
Northwest. 

In 1805 and 1806 Lieut. Pike ascended the Mississippi 
River and explored its soiu-ces, and in 1819-20 Col. Leaven- 
worth located Fort SnellLng at the junction of the Minnesota 
River with the Mississippi. The fort soon became the nu- 
cleus from which radiated a few straggling settlements in 
the vicinity — the feeble beginnings of that mighty wave of 
inpouring settlers that soon were to transform the wilder- 
ness into a Canaan of human habitations. The fur trade 
was the first great attraction, and it is a noteworthy fact 
that two of Minnesota's greatest and noblest men came there 
in the early years of their youth as representatives of fur- 
trading companies — Gen. Sibley, the first governor of the 



12 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

State, in 1834, as the representative of the American Fur 
Co., and Senator Rice, one of the first United States Senators 
of the State, whose statue we are to-day unveiUng, came in 
1839, and soon thereafter became the representative of the 
Chouteau Co. and its successors. At this time there ^^'as a 
considerable military reservation around Fort Snelling, 
extending on both sides of the river up beyond the Falls of 
St. Anthony. This reservation had been secured of the 
Indians through Lieut. Pike. All the rest of the State was 
nominally Indian coimtry, occupied by bands of Sioux and 
Chippewas, although the Sioux had, by the treaty of 1837, 
relinquished their interest in the lands east of the Mississippi. 

Between 1812 and 1 830 Lord Selkirk had made efforts to 
colonize what is now the Province of Manitoba with Scotch 
and Swiss settlers. From various causes these settlements 
had proved dreary failures, and many of the poor and 
wretched settlers, with a contingent of French Canadians, 
had made their way to Minnesota, some settling at Mendota, 
on the south side of the river, others, the major portion, 
settling within the bounds of the military reservation. 
These people, with the troops and the employees of the Gov- 
ernment at Fort Snelling, and a few fur traders and mis- 
sionaries among the Indians, constituted practically all the 
white settlers and the settlements in Minnesota at this 
time. 

The coimtry west of the Mississippi was nominally at- 
tached to and under the jurisdiction of the Territory of 
Iowa, and the country east of the Mississippi was under the 
jurisdiction of Wisconsin, but it was really a sort of "no 
man's land." Practically the only organs of law and order 
were the military, the fur traders, and a few missionaries, 
who between them maintained a truce between the settlers 
and between them and the Indians. The military after a 
while wearied of the settlers on the military reservation, 
and in 1839 expelled them therefrom, and some of these ex- 
pelled settlers located at and became the founders of what 
is now the great and prosperous city of St. Paul. 



Address of Senator Nelson of Minnesota 13 

Such was the situation and such were the times when 
Senator RicE reached Fort SneUing in 1839. And he came 
there well equipped and highly qualified for the great task 
of participating as a leader in laying the foundations of a 
great Commonwealth. He soon became a most prominent 
factor in all public affairs, locating first at Mendota and 
afterwards at St. Paul. When Wisconsin became a State, 
in 1848, it practically left Minnesota in the air, without any 
valid government, and he became an active participant in 
the movement which resulted in the election of Gen. Sibley 
as a Delegate and in the establishment of Minnesota as an 
organized Territory, with its western boundary extending 
to the Missouri River. 

Senator RiCE was of Welsh descent, his family tracing 
back to Lord JCedwelly, Wales. Sir ap-Thomas Fitz Urian 
was the founder of the English family; Edmund Rice, "the 
Pilgrim," as he was called, was the founder of the American 
family. He was born in Barkhamstead, England, in 1594. 
His wife's name was Tamazine. The parish records of 
Sudbury and Barkhamstead record the birth of seven of 
his children. He and his family landed in Massachusetts 
in 1638 and settled at a place which he called Sudbury, 
part of which is now Wayland, then called "The Planta- 
tion." He was one of the thirteen petitioners who besought 
the court for a new plantation; this was granted and the 
plantation was called Marlboro. He was selectman and 
deacon, and was intrusted with many important positions 
by the General Court. He died May 13, 1663, in Massa- 
chusetts. 

Henry M. Rice was the fifth in descent from Edmund 
Rice, "the Pilgrim," and his ancestor moved after some 
years from Massachusetts to Connecticut and New Hamp- 
shire. Mr. Rice's father, Edmund Rice, was bom in Charles- 
town, N. H.; he married Ellen Dvukee, of Royalton, Vt., 
and moved to Waitsfield, Vt., where Henry M. Rice was 
born in 181 7. Among his ancestors he numbers the Spauld- 
ings, Hastings, and Willards. Mr. RicE attended common 



14 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

schools and an academy ; his father died when he was quite 
young. After his death the family moved to Kalamazoo, 
Mich. From there he went to Detroit and made the first 
survey of the Sault Ste. Marie land made by the State of 
Michigan. 

In 1839 he went to Fort Snelling; was post sutler for the 
United States Army at Fort Atkinson and Iowa Territory 
for a short time. He afterwards, for raany years, repre- 
sented Chouteau & Co., and their successor, in the north- 
west fur trade. Wrhen Iowa demanded the removal of the 
Winnebago Indians, Mr. RicE went with a delegation of 
chiefs to "Washington and concluded a treaty for the sale of 
the reservation; he signed the treaty in place of the chief, 
a distinguished mark of confidence by the Indians. 

In 1847 he negotiated treaties with the Chippewas of 
the upper Mississippi and of Lake Superior for cessions of 
their lands in northern Minnesota. 

In 1849 he married Matilda \^1iitall, of Richmond, Va. 
In 1852, when the confirmation of treaties of 1851 with the 
Sioux for their vast possessions in Minnesota was in danger 
of failing, he secured the consent of the Indians to modifica- 
tions of the treaties required by the Senate of the United 
States, and though he was not a beneficiary under the 
treaties, his great tact and ability secured the consent of the 
Sioux to the Senate amendments, and thus in 1853 all of the 
lands of the Sioux in Minnesota west of the Mississippi 
River, except a narrow strip of land on both sides of the 
Minnesota River, were opened to white settlement. 

In 1853 he was elected Delegate for Minnesota Territory 
and reelected in 1855. With the assistance of Douglas, he 
framed the act authorizing Minnesota to form a State 
constitution preparatory to admission and to fix the bound- 
ary line. He was elected United States Senator for Min- 
nesota in 1857; was admitted to his seat in 1858 and served 
until March 3, 1863. 

As a Delegate he secured tlie passage of the act making 
extensive grants of land to the Territory and future vState 
for the construction of our system of raihoads. He also 



Address of Senator Nelson of Minnesota 15 

sectired the passage of a law establishing a surveyor gen- 
eral's office; also acts for the establishment of several land 
offices for the convenience and accommodation of the settlers. 
At this time there was no homestead law, and the preemption 
law of 1 841 did not recognize settlement on unsurveyed 
land. To promote the settlement of the State and give the 
settlers a chance to settle and acquire rights on unsurveyed 
land, he secured the passage of a law by which settlement 
could be made on unsurveyed land, permitting the settlers 
to file a declaratory statement in the local land office and 
giving them the preference right to purchase the land as soon 
as it was surveyed. 

He was also largely instrumental in securing passage of 
the act admitting Minnesota into the Union as a State, and 
by this act two sections of land in every township were 
granted to the State for public school purposes, and seventy- 
two sections of land were granted to the State for the State 
University. Five hundred thousand acres were also granted 
to the State for internal improvements, as well as all the 
swamp lands in the State, together with six sections of land 
for each of twelve salt springs in the State; altogether a 
most liberal and generous grant of land to the State. 

It is to be noted in this connection that prior to this law 
no State had secured more than one section of land per 
township for school purposes. 

As Senator he was a member of the Senate's special com- 
mittee of thirteen to report on the condition of the country 
and to report some mode of averting the threatened rup- 
ture between the North and the South. He was also a 
member of the following standing committees: Indian 
Affairs, Post Offices and Post Roads, PubUc Lands, Military, 
and Finance. 

He served as United States commissioner in making sev- 
eral Indian treaties, and was a member of the board of 
regents of the university ; president of the Minnesota His- 
torical Society ; president of the board of public works, and 
treasurer of Ramsey County. 

40277°— S. Doc. 425, 64-1 2 



1 6 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

Just before the outbreak of the War of the Rebellion, 
$875,000 of certain bonds held by the Government in trust 
for the Indians had been extracted from the safe of the 
Secretary of the Interior; Mr. Rice was instrumental in 
recovering these bonds. A committee of the House was 
appointed to investigate the matter, and reported that Mr. 
Rice was entitled to the thanks of the House and the 
country. 

He was elected a member of the Loyal Legion, chosen 
from those who in civil Ufe during the Rebellion were espe- 
cially distinguished for conspicuous and consistent loyalty 
to the National Government, and who were active and 
eminent in maintaining the supremacy of the same. 

His last pubHc service was when he acted in conjunction 
with Gov. Ramsey and H. S. Fairchild in fixing values of 
the land taken by the State for a new State capitol. Mr. 
Rice gave Rice Park to the city of St. Paul, two acres of 
land, on which are now erected a church and hospital, and 
a fine Ubrary of historical books, relating to the Govern- 
ment from its foundation up. Rice Park, Rice County, 
Rice Lake, and Rice Street are all named for him. He 
died at San Antonio, Tex., January 15, 1894, in the seventy- 
seventh year of his age. 

When the Chippewa Indians heard of Mr. Rice's death, 
they paid him a beautiful compUment through their inter- 
preter, who said among other things that all the Chippewas 
knew Mr. Rice was in a better place, but they would like 
to have him still here. They called him White Rice on 
account of his honesty of character. 

The work done and the results obtained by Senator RiCE 
as a Delegate and as a Senator were of the most far-reach- 
ing and momentous consequences to our young State in its 
infancy. The vast railroad land grants, though encounter- 
ing many vicissitudes, were in the end the foundation and 
great promoter of our extensive network of raibroads. 
These railroads, endowed by these land grants, advanced 
side by side with the settlers, and in many instances pre- 
ceded them and thus greatly hastened the settlement and 



Address of Senator Nelson of Minnesota 17 

development of the country. The generous grant for edu- 
cational purposes has given our liberal, progressive, and 
comprehensive school system a financial foundation such as 
few, if any, of our sister States possess. The first essential 
step in the progress of our State was obtained by the ces- 
sion of the Indian lands and the removal of the Indians. 
It was not until this had been secured that the influx of 
settlers began; and in this great work, by reason of his 
business relations and acquaintance with the Indians, 
Senator Rice rendered most valuable and efficient service. 

But let it never be forgotten that in the midst of these 
leading events there were a multitude of minor, though 
none the less essential, affairs that demanded attention. 
Land offices, post offices, and mail routes, as well as the 
speedy survey of the pubUc lands, were needed. There 
were counties and legislative and judicial districts to be 
estabHshed, settlers to be helped in securing their homes, 
Indians to be placated and kept at a safe distance, and 
transportation routes to be opened. In all these matters 
Senator Rice was most active, efficient, and helpful. 

The progress and welfare of the Territory and young State 
were near to his heart, and his zeal and activity never slack- 
ened in its behalf. He was emphatically a great State 
builder, whose vision and the effect of whose work extended 
into the distant future. We of the present generation have 
reaped, most bountifully reaped, where he, under many 
drawbacks and difficulties, sowed. Three great men cradled 
our State in its infancy — RicE, Ramsey, and Sibley. They 
were a trinity of great men, such as few embryo States have 
been blessed with. They towered above their times and 
environment, as beacon lights for the future generations, to 
admonish us and to guide us in our duties and obligations. 

Senator RicE was not the least of this great trio. He 
was a handsome man, of commanding presence, genial, and 
kind hearted, always ready to help and serve — none so poor 
and humble but that in him they found a friend in the hour 
of need, and none so great that they towered above him 



1 8 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

He was not an orator in the common acceptation of the 
term. He was an orator of action and not of words. Deeds, 
not words, are in the wake of his life. His love for his 
adopted State and for the Federal Union was paramount, 
pure, and untarnished. In the hoirr of the Nation's great 
distress he never faltered in words or in deeds. That Union 
into which, in his earlier manhood, he had inducted our 
young State, was ever uppermost in his love and affection. 
He bore no divided allegiance. 

Scarcely more than three-quarters of a century has elapsed 
since he first cast his lot with our embryo State. At that 
time there were less than two and a half thousand white 
people within its borders. There are now over two and a 
half million of thrifty and happy people, and there is ample 
room for foiu" times that number. By the end of this cen- 
tury Minnesota is likely to find itself with a population of 
ten milhons of industrious, prosperous, and fully assimi- 
lated Americans, as loyal to the flag and the institutions of 
this coimtry as the best type of American citizenship. To 
these millions who succeed us Henry M. Rice will loom up 
over the vista of the passing years as one of the great men 
who cradled and nursed our State in its infancy and breathed 
into it the spirit and life that matured it into a great Com- 
monwealth. 

On behalf of the commission I deliver the statue, duly 
finished and completed, to the State of Minnesota. 

The Presiding Officer. Hon. Moses E. Clapp, Senator 
from the State of Minnesota, has kindly consented to accept 
this statue at the hands of the commission and present the 
same to the United States. Mr. Clapp was intimately 
acquainted with Senator RicE for many years, and I know 
you will be interested in what he will say. 



ADDRESS OF SENATOR CLAPP OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. President, the pleasant duty has devolved upon me 
of accepting this statue on behalf of the State of Minne- 
sota, and, on its behalf, transferring it to you as the rep- 
resentative of the United States. 

Henry Mower Rice was one of a group of great char- 
acters who laid the foundations of a Commonwealth.. 
Minnesota has seen fit, in making a presentation of this 
statue to be placed in this Hall, to single him out from a 
group and honor him with this distinction. 

Mr. Rice was a type. It is said that men make insti- 
tutions and give them form and spirit. On the other hand, 
it is contended that men in their character reflect the spirit 
of the institutions under which they live. Like most 
questions presented by extremes, the real truth lies be- 
tween the extremes. Mr. RiCE and the men of his day 
gave color and form to the institutions which were devel- 
oped in their time. It is equally true that men like Mr, 
Rice were, in a measure, the product of their time and of 
the institutions tmder which they lived. As otu: civiUza- 
tion moved westward in the first half of the last century 
and at the same time developed toward a higher plane, 
the conditions called for men, strong men like Henry 
Mower Rice, and at the same time the conditions which 
surrounded them molded their character. 

It was a condition which required strong men and made 
strong men stronger. Thus it was that Mr. RicE, strong 
by nature, grew stronger under the conditions of which 
he was a part, and, in turn, added to the strength, char- 
acter, and ideals of his time. 

The chiseled marble which to-day we commit to your 
custody will long stand in the shelter of this Dome, a trib- 
ute to the love and honor of a great State to the memory of 

19 



20 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

one who contributed so much to the genius and spirit of its 
growth, yet longer, far longer, will live the spirit of the 
institutions in the molding of which he was such a con- 
spicuous figure and potent factor. 

The Presiding Officer. The members of this commis- 
sion and the people of the State of Minnesota feel highly 
honored that the Vice President of the United States has 
consented to be present to-day and accept this statue at 
our hands, in the name of the United States. 

I take great pleasure in presenting the Vice President. 
[Applause.] 



ADDRESS OF VICE PRESIDENT MARSHALL 

So much of the gratitude of a people due distinguished 
public service and private virtue is never voiced that it 
affords me pleasure to receive and welcome to tliis Hall, 
on the part of the Government of the United States, the 
coimterfeit presentment of one who shed so much luster 
upon the civic virtue of the Commonwealth of Minnesota. 

It would take but a little while to trace the illustrious 
ancestry of Henry Mower Rice and to recall his distin- 
guished public service. 

In the dawnings of American history, one Edmund Rice 
came to Massachusetts and became one of the fathers of 
Marlboro. The late Senator was fifth in descent from this 
pioneer .and Pilgrim and, like his remote ancestor, he felt 
the call of his blood and answered unto it. In blazing paths 
for others to follow, he made the first survey of the Sault 
Ste. Marie; he disclosed his pioneer spirit in forming friendly 
alliances with the Indians of Iowa and Minnesota ; he assisted 
in the conclusion of a treaty for the sale of the Winnebago 
Reservation, negotiated treaties with the Chippewas for 
the cession of their laiids, and largely aided in adjusting 
differences with the Sioux, so that all of Minnesota west of 
the Mississippi River and south of Chippewa County was 
open to white settlers; with Stephen A. Douglas, he drew 
up the act authorizing Minnesota to form a State consti- 
tution preparatory to admission to the Union, and fixed 
the boundaries of the new State; he was a Delegate from 
the Territory and a Senator from the State for five years; 
his services as a Senator were painstaking and patriotic 
and, without desertion of his party, he remained a defender 
of the Union of the States. 

These are the things for which Henry M. Rice was 
known — the things which we have at our tongues' tips for 



22 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

instant service when his name is heard — the things he did 
while in Hfe. 

We now say he is dead, and upon this occasion we have 
met to commemorate his virtues by accepting into this 
Hall of Fame his statue which Minnesota has tendered to 
the Republic as a token of her regard for one of her great 
men gone. 

I might accept it solely in this spirit and be in consonance 
with the common view of hmnankind, but I prefer to accept 
it in a higher and liner spirit. Does life consist in eating, 
drinking, sleeping, talking a multitude of days? Are 
death and bm-ial absolutely synonymous and practically 
sjTichronous ? Are we right in asstuning that so long as 
one moves about in the visible presence of others he is 
alive ? Are we j ustified in declaring that when there come 
silence to the pallid lip and peace to the tlioughtful brow, 
death has intervened? Are not our definitions imperfect 
and incomplete? Must not life include something con- 
tributed to individual or collective good? Must not death 
have intervened when an end came to capacity or desire 
to contribute to the advance or happiness of the human 
race? Is not George Washington far more alive, if there 
can be comparisons witli reference to life, than any one 
who would seek to divert the course of this Republic into 
entangling alliances with foreign powers? Can anyone 
successfully assert that Abraham Lincoln is dead, that the 
impulse which he gave to hmnan freedom has spent its 
force in the intervening years since the assassin's bullet 
was fired? Do not English regiments now face their foe 
dreaming that by their sides stand the men who made the 
charge at Balaklava? Who would be surprised to hear an 
Austrian declare that in the gray dawn of tlie morning 
he saw the spectral form of Maria Teresa leading him 
onward into battle ? 

Assuredly it may not definitely be said when life begins 
or when death intervenes. Life means diiferent things 
in different ages and different lands. Under our flag, it 



Address of Vice President Marshall 23 

means the opportunity to add to the sum of human happi- 
ness and that fair Hberty which does not run with hurrying 
feet toward license. 

So long as that which a man has done or does, has thought 
or thinks, has said or says, helps to keep bright the flames of 
freedom upon the altars of constitutional liberty, that man 
lives. He can not die. Beneath man's thoughts and words 
and deeds there is always the underlying purpose of the 
man. If these words and thoughts and deeds rest upon no 
seciire foundation, they melt speedily back to mother earth, 
and whether the man walks the briar-bordered paths of life 
or rests in some stately mausoleum, aHke he is dead. But 
if his words and thoughts and deeds rest upon a great Rfin- 
ciple or a great purpose, his ashes may be scattered to the 
four winds of heaven, his baptismal name may even be for- 
gotten, but he continues to live; he moves, he speaks in 
trumpet tones to the; sons and daughters of the RepubHc, 
crying out to them that there is opportunity yet to blaze 
paths for righteousness and humanity, for freedom and for 
justice. 

It is in this spirit that I prefer to receive upon the part of 
the RepubHc this statue of a man that I think still Hves, of 
a man who believed in the great and \'ital principles of the 
Republic, and who in the western wilds of the land helped 
to carve out and to add to the Republic a State which would 
be loyal to the Federation, just to its citizenship, and con- 
secrated to the uplift of our common humanity. Beneath 
the carking cares of his everyday life and his splendid pub- 
lic service, I see his devotion to the Republic. He is not 
dead nor will he die while the hope of liberty abides in the 
breasts of a single son or daughter of Minnesota, nor while 
the onward rush of humanity is toward that far-off divine 
event wherein it is hoped to make the whole world kin. 

Hail to the immortal ! Farewell to the mortal ! And yet 
again, hail! 



24 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

The Presiding Officer. These ceremonies, and appro- 
priate ceremonies in the Congress shortly to be had, will be 
made a matter of record and preserved for all time. Before 
we adjourn I will ask Dr. Montgomery to dismiss us with the 
benediction. 

benediction 

Dr. Montgomery. Now may the grace, mercy, and peace 
of God, otu" heavenly Father, the blessed example of Jesus 
Christ, our Saviour and brother, and the comfort of the 
Holy Spirit, abide with you and keep you always. Amen. 



ACCEPTANCE OF 

STATUE OF 

HENRY MOWER RICE 



BY THE SENATE 
FEBRUARY 19, 1916 

BY THE HOUSE 
MARCH II, 1916 



PROCEEDINGS IN THE SENATE 

JANUARY 26, 1916 

Mr. Nelson. I submit a resolution, which I send to the 
desk, and ask for its immediate consideration. 

The Vice President. The resolution submitted by the 
Senator from Minnesota will be read. 

The Secretary read the resolution (S. Res. 80), as follows: 

Resolved, That exercises appropriate to the reception and acceptance from 
the State of Minnesota of the statue of Henry Mower Rice, erected in Stat- 
uary Hall in the Capitol, be made the special order for Saturday, February 
19, 1916, after the conclusion of the routine morning business. 

Mr. Nelson. Mr. President, I wish to say in explanation 
of the resolution that the statue of Mr. Rice, who was the 
first Senator from Minnesota, is soon to be placed in Stat- 
uary Hall in the Capitol, and that this resolution follows the 
precedent which has been established in such cases. 

The resolution was considered by unanimous consent and 
agreed to. 

FEBRUARY 19, 1916 

Mr. Nelson. Mr. President, I send to the desk a concur- 
rent resolution which I ask to have read. 

The Vice President. The Secretary will read the con- 
current resolution. 

The concurrent resolution (S. Con. Res. 13) was read and 
considered, as follows: 

Resolved by the Senate {Ihe House of Representatives concurring), That the 
statue of Henry Mower Rice, presented by the State of Minnesota to be 
placed in Statuary Hall, is accepted in the name of the United States, and 
that the thanks of Congress be tendered to the State for the contribution of 
the statue of one of its most eminent citizens, illustrious for the piuity of 
his life and his distinguished services to the State and Nation. 

Second. That a copy of these resolutions, suitably engrossed and duly 
authenticated, be transmitted to the governor of the State of Minnesota. 

27 



ADDRESSES 



ADDRESS OF MR. NELSON OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. President, Congress has accorded to each State of the 
Union the privilege of placing in this Capitol, in Statuary- 
Hall, statues of two of its eminent men, to be selected by 
the respective States. Minnesota has now for the first 
time availed herself of this privilege by placing in Statuary 
Hall a statue of Henry M. Rice, one of the first represent- 
atives of the State of Minnesota in this body. 

Mr. Rice was bom in the State of Vermont in the year 
1817. He came to what is now the State of Minnesota, but 
was then an unexplored wilderness, a sort of "no man's 
land," in 1839, 10 years before Minnesota became an or- 
ganized Territory. In 1853 he was elected a Delegate to 
Congress from that Territory. He was reelected in 1S55; 
and in 1857 he and Gen. Shields were elected the first 
Senators from the State of Minnesota. Mr. RicE took his 
seat in the Senate of the United States in May, 1858, on 
the admission of the State into the Union. 

Senator RicE had a most remarkable record. He was one 
of the great men who came to the embryo State who were 
instrumental in laying the foundations of our government 
and of our prosperity. When he first came to the State he 
was engaged as the respresentative of one of the great fur 
companies. At that time the country was an unexplored 
wilderness. There were very few people except some sol- 
diers at Fort Snelling and a few missionaries, and in addi- 
tion to that the fin: traders and their employees. By 
reason of the fact that as a fur trader Mr. RicE became 
intimate with the Indians, he became very popular with 
them. They looked upon him with favor, because he 

29 



30 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

always treated them fairly, and as a consequence he was 
largely instrumental in secm-ing their consent to the open- 
ing of the country to white settlement. When he came to 
the State in 1839 the whole country, except a little terri- 
tory around Fort Snelling, was occupied by nomadic bands 
of Sioux and Chippewa Indians. 

The first great problem of the embryo State was to se- 
cure those lands from the Indians, and to obtain the re- 
moval of the Indians therefrom. In this matter Senator 
Rice was very active and efficient. He perhaps had more 
influence than anybody else with the Indians; and, as a 
result of his efforts, in the forties and early fifties, the 
Sioux and Chippewa Indians ceded to the United States 
most of their lands in Minnesota, and that opened the 
country to settlement and enabled it to embark on the 
great progress it has since made. 

Senator RicE, as a Delegate in Congress, had the strenu- 
ous work that falls to the lot of a Delegate from a Terri- 
tory. He was very efficient and very industrious in se- 
ctu^ing suitable legislation for the young Territory. It is a 
remarkable fact that at the time Mr. RicE came to Minne- 
sota a portion of the State was under the jurisdiction of the 
State of Iowa, and a portion of it under the jurisdiction of 
the State of Wisconsin. In 1848, when Wisconsin became 
a State, it left that part of Minnesota east of the Mississippi 
River without any government, a sort of no man's land; 
and the first important task Senator RicE had to perform 
was in aiding to secure legislation creating the Territory of 
Minnesota. 

As a Delegate in Congress Mr. RicE was largely instru- 
mental in preparing and securing the passage of the enabling 
act authorizing Minnesota to adopt a State constitution 
and to become a member of the Federal Union, and the 
vState honored him by electing him one of its first Senators. 
He was elected at the same time as Gen. Shields, who had 
the unique distinction of having represented in this body 
three different States; but when they came here to the 



Address of Mr. Nelson of Minnesota 31 

Senate of the United States Gen. Shields drew the short 
term and Mr. Rice drew the long term. 

Mr. Rice was a Member of this body from 1858 until 1 863. 
He served on some of the most important committees and 
was a most active and efficient Member of this body. He 
was a man of fine education, of great intellectual abilities, 
a man of sterling character, and a man who always aimed 
to serve the public efficiently and faithfully. 

Minnesota was fortunate in having in its early days a 
number of young men who came from the East and started 
it on the path to statehood. Among these men — and it has 
been my lot to be acquainted with many of them — one of 
the most eminent was Senator RicE, and I feel that the 
State has made a wise choice in selecting him as its first 
representative here in Statuar>^ Hall. 

Mr. President, I have elsewhere' on another occasion in a 
more extended manner paid my tribute to Senator Rice, 
and I will not take the time of the Senate further on this 
occasion. There are other Senators who were acquainted 
with the Senator who will dwell more on his great merits 
and his value both to the State of Minnesota and to our 
common country. 

402T7°— S. Doc. 425, 6t-l 3 



ADDRESS OF MR. UNDERWOOD OF ALABAMA 

Mr. President, the State of Minnesota was bom in the 
space of a decade. Originally a part of the Territory of 
Wisconsin, it became a Territory almost immediately after 
the State of Wisconsin was admitted to the Union. It then 
had a population of scarcely 5,000 souls. Within 10 years 
it was admitted to statehood, with a population of nearly 
300,000 people. 

Three great men contributed primarily to the birth and 
building of the State. Henry H. Sibley, the first Delegate 
from the Territory to the Congress of the United States, the 
man who secured Territorial recognition and afterwards the 
first governor of the State. Alexander Ramsey, the State's 
first Territorial governor and subsequently one of its Repre- 
sentatives in the Congress of the United States; the man 
who primarily secured the cession of territory from the 
Indian tribes and opened the way to white civilization. A 
few days after Gov. Ramsey was appointed the Territorial 
governor and came to St. Paul to reside, another citizen 
established himself in that city. His ambition was not 
primarily to gather the unearned increment in the rapidly 
growing metropolis of the future, for he almost immediately 
showed his desire to take part in civic affairs and serve well 
the people of his adopted State. Henry M. Rice was born 
in Vermont in 181 7, and at the age of 19 years emigrated to 
the State of Wisconsin. He came to Minnesota in 1839 
equipped with an academy education, and he had studied 
law for two years. He was first employed by the Chouteaus, 
of St. Louis, who had acquired the business of the American 
Fur Co., and afterwards became a partner in this business 
and moved to Mendota, Minn., for a short time, but subse- 
quently located permanently in St. Paul. Mr. RicB was a 
leader in every enterprise that looked to the development 

32 



Address of Mr. Underwood of Alabama 33 

of the town. Whatever success he made he generously 
shared with the pubHc. His personal quahties were such 
that they were immediately recognized. He was given 
pubhc employment and secured great success in it. His 
manners were so gracious — and yet not patronizing — that 
he made friends with all sorts and conditions of men. He 
divined with unerring instinct the motives of men and parties 
and knew when and how by appropriate suggestion to let 
them apparently move themselves toward his desired ends. 
He was the personal representative of the Sioux Tribe of 
Winnebagoes, always held their confidence, and successfully 
managed their affairs both for the Indians and the white 
settlers who were rapidly building homes in the State. 

Mr. Rice was bom a Democrat, of the old Jeffersonian 
school of democracy, and remained true to the faith even 
during the trying times of the War between the States. 

He was first elected to office as Delegate from Minnesota in 
the Thirty-third Congress. He took his seat as Delegate in 
Congress in December, 1853. Industrious, persuasive, and 
soon influential, he promoted in many ways the interests of 
the Territory and his constituents, and by so doing obtained 
a popularity hardly equaled in the history of Minnesota. He 
was diligent in laboring for the extension of the surveys and 
the establishment of land offices. He secured the opening 
of post offices in the new villages. His influence contributed 
to the extension of the preemption system to unsurveyed 
lands, a change which virtually opened all lands not Indian 
to settlement. Mr. Rice's personal qualities were such as to 
give him wide acquaintance and influence, and these were 
extended in no small degree by those of the Virginia lady 
whom he had taken as his wife, n^e Miss Matilda Whitall. 
Standing for reelection in the fall of 1855 he won by a hand- 
some plurality over his Republican opponent and an Inde- 
pendent Democratic candidate. 

Delegate RicE, desiring to secure statehood for his constit- 
uents, early in the session of 1857 had introduced a bill to. 



34 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

enable the people of Minnesota to organize a State and come 
into the Union. The bill was subject to long debate and 
serious contention in both Houses of the Congress, but be- 
fore the end of the session it was enacted into law and ap- 
proved by the President. 

The enabling act as passed February 26, 1857, was in the 
form which had become traditional, and embodied grants of 
public lands for schools, a universit}', and public buildings. 

Henry H. Sibley having been elected the first governor of 
the State, and the Territorial legislature organized, it was 
necessary to elect two United States Senators. Henry M. 
Rice, as everybody expected, was nominated by his party 
caucus without opposition and subsequently elected. Gen. 
James W. Shields, who was a newcomer in Miimesota and 
little known, but who had served with distinction in the 
Mexican War and filled many offices in his former State, 
Illinois, and had served a term in the United States Senate 
from that State, was elected as his colleague. 

Henry M. Rice served in every position to which he was 
called by his people with distinguished ability and an unfal- 
tering desire to promote the welfare of his State and his 
country. His memory is cherished in the hearts of all who 
knew him, and his life will always be an example to the com- 
ing generations of yotmg men in his State to inspire them to 
high ideals and a patriotic performance of all public duties. 



ADDRESS OF MR. HARDING OF OHIO 

Mr. President, there is no particular occasion for me to add 
a word of tribute to the memory of him whom we are hon- 
oring to-day, save that in Ohio we feel a very close relation- 
ship to Minnesota, because the two States were a part of the 
Northwest Territory which was Virginia's magnificent gift 
to an expanding Nation. I recalled, while the Senator from 
Alabama [Mr. Underwood] was speaking, that when the 
patriotism of the South and the patriotism of the North were 
in conflict to wipe out an ambiguity in the Constitution, the 
States builded out of the great Northwest Territory gave a 
million muskets and 50,000 swords toward the preservation 
of our nationality. 

I like to say a word of tribute to the memory of Mr. RiCE 
because of the stalwart type he so notably characterized. 
There are two classes of American builders, Mr. President, 
who ought to be immortalized. One class is composed of 
those stalwart and seemingly inspired fathers who laid the 
foundation of this Republic, seemingly the first dependable, 
representative, popular Government on the face of the earth. 
But no less important are the rugged pioneers who marched 
under the light of the westward star of empire and laid the 
foundations of the great western Commonwealths, which 
have done so much in contributing to the expansion and the 
enlargement and the glorification of the American Nation. 

I sometimes think we have been remiss in paying a just 
estimate to the work of the pioneers. One of my age can 
have no intimate knowledge of the hardships they endured, 
of the personalities that they developed ; but I can recall in 
my boyhood time a very interesting experience when the 
sons and the daughters of the men of Ohio were attracted by 
the lure of the still farther West, at a time when railway 
transportation had not opened up the great avenues of the 

35 



36 Stattie of Henry Mower Rice 

West, when a class of our sturdy sons and daughters, bred 
by those stalwarts who had developed the Buckeye State — 
and I speak of it as only one of many contributing States — 
these sons and daughters, with barely more than sufficient 
means to furnish a wagon and a team with a verv Umited 
equipment, took all that they had of material possessions, 
and with courage in their hearts and resolution in their 
breasts made the overland trip westward for the develop- 
ment of Iowa and Kansas and Minnesota, all the time mov- 
ing westward to contribute to the jewels in the crown of the 
expanded Nation. I know that in those days they succeeded 
because they were made of that stem stuff which had devel- 
oped amid discouragement at home. They had failed in 
their undertakings for one reason or another, and they were 
resolved to start anew, just as the New England fathers did 
when they planted their first colony at Plymouth Rock. 
And out of that resolution and their hardships and then- 
simple life, out of that determination to do for themselves, 
they laid the foundations of the developing West. Whoever 
they were, no matter from whence they started anew, these 
pioneers were the great builders. And I want to say that 
the man who laid the comer stone of a great Commonwealth 
like the State of Minnesota is entitled to the enduring trib- 
ute of the American people. 

One word more, Mr. President, on that. I should Hke to 
be able to say something, though in a less rambling way than 
I am obliged to-day, to preserve and magnify the type of 
that sterling American citizensliip. It is good to recall that 
200 years ago, or 400 years ago, or any period one may 
choose, there were in the State of Minnesota the same soil, 
the same waters, the same mineral wealth, the same oppor- 
tunity for man's fortunate habitation that exist there to- 
day. But it required the human touch; it required the 
application and ministration of citizenship, and the devel- 
oping efforts of those who went out and made battle with 
nature's wilderness, when heroes perished without fame's 
acclaim. It was those who went out and turned the wilder- 



Address of Mr. Harding of Ohio 37 

ness into a garden spot and made the most and the greatest 
achievement possible to man. And they did it because of 
rugged individuality, conquering personality, and real citi- 
zenship. They did it because they Uved simply and pushed 
forward in a determination to achieve. I tell you, Senators, 
if there is any one thing needed to go on in the fulfillment of 
our great American life it is the preservation of their sterling 
quaUties of a citizenship enhanced by a simple life. 

It strikes me that if there is any one great menacing 
tendency in modern times growing out of our material good 
fortune it is the tendency to a Ufe which was never intended 
to be adopted if one aims at accomplishment. I like to recall 
the simplicity of the pioneers. They had the same motives, 
they had the same desires which have impelled mankind 
from the beginning of the world; but they were content in 
their own consciousness of accomplishment. They were 
intensely patriotic. They were appreciative of the oppor- 
tunities that came from the founding fathers, and, hke the 
man to whose memory we are seeking to pay tribute to-day, 
they were abidingly honest. 

I like what the Senator from Minnesota [Mr. Nelson] 
said about the standing of Mr. RiCE with the Indians. I 
take it that he not only dealt honestly in his personal rela- 
tionships, but he kept his contracts; and I want to say in 
offering my tribute that the one great example we need in 
these United States is the man who is abidingly honest and 
keeps his contracts, whatever they may be. 

Mr. President, I had not intended to speak even at this 
length. I am glad that Minnesota has placed its memorial 
of Mr. Rice in the Hall of Statuary, and I am glad that there 
is a line to go in the Record in making our acknowledg- 
ments to the State of Minnesota, because we ought to prize 
this example of sturdy, stalwart, honest, and patriotic Amer- 
ican citizenship developed in the great work of adding a 
Commonwealth to the American Union. 



ADDRESS OF MR. GALLINGER OF NEW HAMPSHIRE 

Mr. President, as the senior Senator from Minnesota [Mr. 
Nelson] has aheady stated, Henry M. Rice was a Delegate 
from the Territory of Minnesota in tlie Thirty-third and 
Thirty-fourth Congresses, and a Member of the Senate from 
May II, 1858, to March 3, 1863. This was during an inter- 
esting period of our history, the years shortly preceding the 
Civil War. Mr. RiCE left the Senate 28 years before I 
entered it, so that my knowledge of the man is a matter of 
history. 

The Senators from Minnesota have asked me, as the 
present oldest Senator in years and in continuous service, 
to say a few words on this interesting occasion, and I have 
not found it in my heart to do otherwise than respond to 
the wish of my genial colleagues from that great State, 
inadequate as my words must of necessity be. 

Mr. Rice was of New England ancestry, having been 
bom in the State of Vermont, emigrating to Minnesota at 
an early age. Wliile serving as a Delegate in Congress, the 
President of the United States was Franklin Pierce, a New 
Hampshire man. The Senate, at the time Mr. RicE 
entered it, contained in its membership many men of great 
ability as orators, legislators, and statesmen, some of whom 
figured largely in the stirring events which shortly followed. 
In that list are foimd the names of Clement C. Clay, jr., of 
Alabama, Robert W. Johnson of Arkansas, William M. Gwin 
and David C. Broderick of California, Lafayette S. Foster 
of Connecticut, James A. Bayard of Delaware, David A. 
Yulee of Florida, Robert Toombs of Georgia, Stephen A. 
Douglas and Lyman Trumbull of Illinois, Jesse D. Bright 
of Indiana, James Harlan of Iowa, John J. Crittenden of 
Kentucky, Judah P. Benjamin of Louisiana, William Pitt 
Fessenden and Hannibal Hamlin of Maine, Charles Sumner 
38 



Address of Mr. Gallinger of New Hampshire 39 

and Henry Wilson of Massachusetts, Zachariah Chandler of 
Michigan, Jefferson Davis of Mississippi, James Bell and 
John P. Hale of New Hampshire, William H. Seward and 
Preston King of New York, Benjamin F. Wade and 
George E- Pugh of Ohio, Joseph Lane of Oregon, Simon 
Cameron of Pennsylvania, Andrew P. Butler of South Caro- 
lina, John Bell and Andrew Johnson of Tennessee, Sam 
Houston of Texas, Solomon Foot and Jacob CoUamer of 
Vermont, James M. Mason of Virginia, and James R. Doo- 
little of Wisconsin, a list of able men, never excelled in the 
history of our country. 

In addition to the two distinguished men who represented 
New Hampshire in the Senate at that time, in the list are 
found the names of three other natives of m}- State — William 
Pitt Fessenden of Maine, Zachariah Chandler of Michigan, 
and Henry Wilson of Massachusetts, men who left a deep 
impress upon the legislation of the country. 

Mr. Rice did not make many set speeches while in the 
Senate, but the Congressional Globe shows that he fre- 
quently engaged in running debate. He took a vital interest 
in all matters relating to the Indians, of whom there were 
many in Minnesota, and also in the administration of the 
public land laws, postal affairs, and tlie building of the Pacific 
railroad. He contended that the Pacific railroad should start 
from a point on the boundary of Minnesota instead of from 
a point on the Missouri River. 

On a certain occasion, after a heated debate between 
Senators Dixon and Fessenden, Senator RicE expressed 
himself as being much opposed to personal controversies of 
that kind, saying that the older Senators should not set a 
bad example to the younger ones. On another occasion, 
when an attempt was made to stop applause in the galleries, 
imder the threat that if repeated the galleries would be 
cleared. Senator RicE expressed himself as follows: 

The people come for the purpose of listening to speeches that are made 
and when the impulses of their hearts shall induce them to applaud I will not 
condemn it. I hope they will be permitted to remain. 



40 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

On the whole, Senator Rice seems to have been very- 
attentive to his senatorial duties and to have been on the 
right side of all questions that were of concern to the people 
whom he represented. He was a fit representative of those 
whom he served, and, judged by his legislative record, 
served them with ability and fidelity, thus fully earning tlie 
recognition that the people of Minnesota are to-day bestow- 
ing on him. 



ADDRESS OF MR. CLAPP OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. President, when in my youth it was my privilege first 
to meet Mr. RicE, he had ah-eady passed the meridian of 
life, and presented that attractive spectacle of one whose 
step was still strong, whose eyes were nndimmed, whose 
faculties were unimpaired, and yet who showed the mellow- 
ing touch of time and in the retirement of age could enjoy 
the reflections which come after a life of achievement. 

It has been said that our race has been a weary traveler. 
It is certainly true that that portion of humanity from which 
we are sprung has made a wonderful pilgrimage, whether in- 
spired by Divine commission or whether bom of the instincts 
of those who compose that current of humanity none can 
say. That current of humanity possessed two remarkable 
traits, two remarkable characteristics. Coming in early 
days from somewhere in the then great unknown of eastern 
Europe, it moved along the northern coast, draining the 
morass and the swamp, leveling the forest, braving the 
Northern Sea, reaching those islands which even in Biblical 
times were known as the Isles of the North, ever moving, 
ever pressing westward, the vanguard crossing the trackless 
and uncharted Atlantic, it found its lodgment upon what was 
then the somewhat inhospitable coast of New England ; but 
still it moved westward, and over moimtains and through 
defiles, hewing its way through forests, it finally spread out 
upon the great inland plains of oiu" continent. 

Another remarkable trait of that branch of the human 
family is found in the fact that while it ever moved v.^est- 
ward, it ever moved toward the goal of freer government, 
until it reached that goal in the foimding of this Government. 
But the establishment of otur Government, like the lodgment 
of this ciurent of humanity upon the Atlantic coast, was not 
the end; it was but the beginning of a greater chapter. 
While our fathers, wise in their day and generation, founded 

41 



42 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

a Government, the outcome of a patriotic wisdom never be- 
fore witnessed in any assemblage in history, yet the written 
government is cold and lifeless, the words upon the page 
have no meaning, unless those words are woven into action, 
into spirit, and into purpose. 

To-day there are upon the American Continent govern- 
ments which copied our Constitution, and yet present the 
sad spectacle of despotism or, what may be worse, the 
tyranny of anarchy itself. It is in the spirit, in the purpose 
of a people that the fabric of written legislation must be 
woven and developed into spirit, pmpose, and living form. 
As that current of humanity moved westward and began to 
diffuse itself over the great inland plain, it took upon itself 
the task of molding government. In the genesis of this 
movement from that somewhat mysterious dawn in the 
shade of the history of northern Europe down to the time of 
our own day each generation has well done its work. Those 
men who drained the swamps and the morasses of northern 
Europe, those who rescued the soil of Holland from the grasp 
of the sea, those who developed a civilization in England, 
those who brought a John to a recognition of the rights of 
man, those people who brought a Charles to the block, those 
who in turn founded this Government, those who endured 
the hardship of a revolution that we might be free, those 
who in later days preserved the Union thus founded, those 
who tracked the trackless forests of the West and converted 
the plains of the midland to the habitation of man, those 
who in the years gone have given form and color to the 
spirit of our institutions, each and all well performed their 
part in their day and generation. 

The last great task of this movement after the establish- 
ment of government and as essential to the developments of 
the spirit of oiu" institutions was the establishment of oppor- 
tunity, and through the efforts to subjugate the material 
character of our land, tlirough the establishment of free gov- 
ernment, and through the establishment of equality of oppor- 
tunity, there came the great characters which have adorned 
the pages of our history, because this made it possible in the 



/ 



Address of Mr. Clapp of Minnesota 43 

character of the men themselves not only to surmount all 
other obstacles, but also to overcome the limitations of 
humble origin and a boyhood of poverty. Part and parcel 
of this great movement was the man whose name we honor 
to-day. 

Bom in New England, leaving his New England home 
when even the humble surroundings of a New England 
home of a century ago spelled civilization compared with 
the wildness into which he was to penetrate, he went west- 
ward and joined for a while the efforts of those who were 
laying the foundations of what is now the great Common- 
wealth of Michigan. There he joined with those who, then 
in the first flush of their young manhood, were engaged in 
this American task of building government, fitting our 
country for civilization and development along great and 
lasting lines — men then unknown, but men who, by their 
energy, their sturdy characters, and wisdom, not only laid 
deep and broad the foundations of that great Common- 
wealth, but brought fame to themselves in their achieve- 
ments. But this liu-e of the West that had called this race 
caused Mr. Rice to move farther westward, until he found 
himself in what is now the State of Minnesota. 

I wish I had the descriptive power to portray the char- 
acter of that class of men of which he was a fitting type. 
They were peculiar in themselves; their like is found no- 
where else in our history. There was a culture and refine- 
ment about them; they could adorn the bench, the Senate 
Hall, or my lady's parlor. There was a certain dash about 
them; and yet there was that fortitude, that courage, that 
power of endiurance that enabled them to withstand all the 
severe and untried conditions of the western country. 

If you understand the nature of the Indian as he was 
when our forefathers landed on these shores, you will not 
wonder that between men of this type and the leaders of 
the Indians there sprang up a friendship amounting almost 
to affection, because, while there rolled between the leaders 
of the Indian tribes and these cultured, refined men that 
gulf that separates the educated and the cultm^ed from the 



44 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

uneducated and the uncultured, there was a strong cmrent 
of sympathy in nobility of character that drew them to- 
gether in that knightly spirit that, after all, was the pre- 
dominating feature of these great pioneers. And when 
Mr. Rice passed away, borrowing an expression which my 
colleague [Mr. Nelson] used in Statuary Hall on the occa- 
sion of the unveiUng of the statue of this distinguished son 
of Minnesota, the Indians who had known him so well 
during all these years said that, while they believed he had 
gone to a brighter and a better land, yet, after all, they 
wished he might have remained with them. 

No generation ever has measured, or ever will in its own 
time measure, accurately either the direction, the speed, or 
the force of the movement of which it is a part. It is only 
after the long sweep of the centuries that there can be \-iewed 
the connection between events sequential in their character. 
It is only then that there can be made a measurement of 
the great movements of humanity. So to-day, while we 
wonder at the great growth of our cities, the development 
of our land, the limitless wealth and resoinrces of otu: Nation, 
we can not adequately measure the direction, the scope, or 
the force of the movement of which we are a part. It may, 
however, be interesting for me to say that I have in my 
possession a small book, a very small book, which contains 
the record of the enactments of the First Territorial Council 
of Minnesota; and, as small as that book is, an appendix to 
that Httle book contains the census, giving by name every 
inhabitant of the then Territory of Minnesota. To-day 
some two and a half million people constitute the humanity 
of that great Commonwealth, and that within the Hfetime 
of those now living. Into that wonderful work of material 
and institutional development Mr. RicE threw liimself with 
all his 7.eal and ardor, and he helped to develop that Com- 
monwealth, and that Commonwealth in turn has honored 
him. 

It so happens that each State can only place two statues 
of its distinguished citizens in Statuary Hall; yet of the 
people of the Western States there are unnumbered thou- 



Address of Mr. Clapp of Minnesota 45 

sands who well deserve the recognition we have accorded 
Mr. Rice. As I have said, however, it is impossible to 
accord this particular distinction to more than two, and I 
feel to-day that if Mr. RicE could, in a continuation of his 
personal identity, look down upon these services, appre- 
ciating, as he would, the great honor that is being conferred 
on him, yet out of the generous impulses of his nature he 
would wish that the statues of those who had shared in that 
great work of the past might also adorn Statuary Hall. 

It is wise that we accord this honor; it is wise that we 
keep alive the memory of those who have gone before. 
Man is so constituted that he must ever have a symbol, 
something as the outward form to express the thought that 
is within him. We can not have a country without a flag; 
we can not have reUgion without a church. Man must ever 
have a symbol and a shrine, and it is well that we take as 
our symbol the names of the leaders of the past; it is well 
that we worship at the shrine of their achievements. Their 
names as symbols, their achievements as a shrine, may serve 
to keep within our midst that strong and vigorous charac- 
ter and nature which everyone recognizes the higher and 
more complex civilization must more and more weaken if 
not destroy. 

Mr. President, I have spoken more of the genesis of the 
movement of which Mr. Rice was a part and a type than I 
have of Mr. RiCE himself, because, after all, it is his contri- 
bution to the genesis of this movement, it is this environ- 
ment and this condition which combined to make the 
achievements of Mr. Rice worthy of the commemoration 
which the great State of Minnesota has bestowed upon 
them. 

Mr. President, I move the adoption of the resolution 
offered by my colleague. 

The Vice President. Without objection, on the motion 
of the Senator from Minnesota [Mr. Clapp], the resolutions 
are unanimously adopted. 



PROCEEDINGS IN THE HOUSE 

FEBRUARY 21, 1916 

A message from the Senate, by Mr. Waldorf, one of its 
clerks, armonnced that the Senate had passed the followhig 
concurrent resolution, in which the concurrence of the 
House was requested: 

SENATE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION 13 

Resolved by the Senate (tlte House of Representatives concurring), That the 
statue of Henry Mower Rice, presented by the State of Minnesota to be 
placed in Statuary Hall, is accepted in the name of the United States, and 
that the thanks of Congress be tendered to the State for the contribution of 
the statue of one of its most eminent citizens, illustrious for the purity of his 
life and his distinguished services to the State and Nation. 

. Second. That a copy of these resolutions, suitably engrossed and duly 
authenticated, be transmitted to the governor of the State of Minnesota. 

Mr. Miller of Minnesota rose. 

The Speaker. For what purpose does the gentleman 
from Minnesota rise ? 

Mr. Miller of Minnesota. To ask unanimous consent 
that that part of Satiuday, March 1 1 , beginning at 4 o'clock, 
and continuing to the end of the day, be set apart for the 
consideration of Senate conciurent resolution No. 13 and 
for eulogies relative to the life, character, and public services 
of Henry M. Rice, a Senator from Minnesota. 

The Speaker. What date ? 

Mr. Miller of Minnesota. Saturday, March 1 1 , begin- 
ning at 4 o'clock. 

The Speaker. The gentleman from Minnesota asks unani- 
mous consent that on Satiurday, the nth of March, at 4 
o'clock, the House consider the Senate concmrent resolu- 
tion No. 13, touching the life, character, and public services 
of Senator RiCE, of Minnesota. Is there objection? 

There was no objection. 

march 11, 1916 

The House met at 12 o'clock noon. 

The Chaplain, Rev. Henry N. Couden, D. D., offered the 
following prayer: 

40277°— S. Doc. 425, 64-1 4 47 



48 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

Our Father in heaven, we thank Thee that down deep in 
the heart of man is that something which we call conscience, 
which sits in judgment upon his acts, upbraiding him when 
he does what he knows to be wrong, encouraging him when 
he does what he knows to be right, and which recognizes 
the strong, brave, heroic man who stands for the good of his 
fellow men ; hence we thank Thee for the special order set 
apart in this House to-day in recognition of a strong, noble- 
minded, heroic man, who gave to his Territory, State, and 
Nation his thought and deeds for the betterment of condi- 
tions in a popular government. 

It is well that the lawmakers of our land pause amid their 
activities and pay their tribute of respect and gratitude for 
the life, character, and public services of such a man, that 
they may be inspired to give themselves to the great work 
of purifying and ennobling the conditions of our beloved 
country, that they, too, may leave behind them a record 
which will stand the test of time and the approbation of not 
only their own conscience but the conscience of their fellow 
men. In the spirit of the Master. Amen. 

The Speaker pro tempore. Under the special order here- 
tofore adopted by the House, this time is set apart for the 
consideration of Senate conciurent resolution 13, which the 
Clerk will report. 

The Clerk read as follows: 

Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring) , That the 
statue of Henry Mower Rice, presented by the State of Minnesota to be 
placed in Statuary Hall, is accepted in the name of the United States, and 
that the thanks of Congress be tendered to the State for the contribution of 
the statue of one of its most eminent citizens, illustrious for the purity of his 
life and his distinguished services to the State and Nation. 

Second. That a copy of these resohitions, suitably engrossed and duly 
authenticated, be transmitted to the governor of the State of Minnesota. 

The Speaker pro tempore. The gentleman from Minne- 
sota [Mr. Volstead] will take the chair during these cere- 
monies. 

Mr. Volstead took the chair as Speaker pro tempore. 



ADDRESSES 



ADDRESS OF MR. DAVIS OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker, as the veil parted from the statue and the 
marble figtire of Henry Mower Rice stood forth in Statuary 
Hall the beautiful thought of Vice President Marshall came 
home with force, I have no doubt, to the minds of us all. 

In the pmpose which guided his life, in the spirit which 
imbued his public service, in the principles to which he was 
ever steadfast, in the great work which he achieved for his 
State and his fellow men, as in the memories which his 
statue inspires, Henry Mower Rice still lives. 

He lives in the friendly treaties which he negotiated be- 
tween our Republic and its Indian wards. He lives in the 
thousands of homes which through his vision and his timely 
missionary aid have been carved out of a wilderness. He 
lives in the great iron routes of travel which have carried 
settlement and the fruits of civilized life over a domain 
greater than that of New England. He lives in the great 
organic acts which, first, converted a northern wild into an 
organized Federal Territory and now for nearly two genera- 
tions into one of the great sovereign States of the Union. 
He lives in the institutions and in the peaceful prosperity 
of a Commonwealth which to-day counts citizenship in 
millions, and he lives in the hearts and enlightened minds 
of hundreds of thousands of Minnesota school children who 
through his prophetic vision and effective public aid enjoy 
the fruits of perhaps the greatest public educational heritage 
in the world. 

The ceremony which we have witnessed in our National 
Hall of Fame is more than the unveiling of a statue. It is 
more than the unveiling even of the life and the works of 
the man. As my mind goes back to the scenes in which he 
lived, to the pioneer causes for which he stood, and to those 
battles of the wilderness which he fought, the history of 

49 



50 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

Minnesota itself seems to be unveiled as by a great magic 
wand. Scenes, forces, causes, and the great characters 
which moved on the stage of a day that is gone come before 
us as in a dream. 

Up the valley of the Minnesota River and westward across 
the waving prairies to the Dakota Bad Lands we see the 
scattered bands and hear the war whoop of the red-painted 
Sioux. We see their tepees of deerskin in the groves along 
the river and their war ponies tethered in the wild pastures, 
which, in the days to come, are to support one of the richest 
dairy regions of the earth. We see the attempts of our 
Government to effect friendly treaties with the Indians fail. 
The Sioux treaty of 1851 is repudiated. Efforts of Govern- 
ment agents and the resolutions of the United States Senate 
come to naught. Across this great fertile empire from the 
Mississippi westward to the Missouri we see only one stamp 
of human existence, and that the life of the Sioux upon the 
warpath; and the only law of life and liberty is the law of 
the tomahawk and scalping knife. 

We look again, and we see the heroic figure which the 
sculptor has endeavored to symbolize in marble. We see 
the rugged frame and genial smile of this practical man of 
the woods and the plains — descended from hardy Pilgrim 
stock, trained in woodcraft and Indian lore, educated both 
by the books of the schools and by life in tlie Indian fur 
trade, with heart big enough to feel the rights of botli red- 
skin and white-face, and with brain and shoulders broad 
enough to bring the hostile forces to the common ground of 
human right and peace — we see this man throwing to the 
winds the conflicting claims of Government and Indian war 
chieftains, and bring forth a new treaty, acceptable to all, 
establishing the redskin bands in happy hunting grounds 
and opening the great prairies west of the Mississippi to 
the march of settlement and civilization. 
■ We see this man so trusted by the tribes of the Winne- 
bagoes, who dwell in Iowa to the south, that their chieftains 
ask him to sign their treaties in their stead; and the stroke 



Address of Mr. Davis of Minnesota 51 

of his pen opens to white settlement vast areas of that great 
agricultural Commonwealth. 

We see him as he embarks for the north by barge and 
birch-bark canoe up the far reaches of the Mississippi to the 
head sources of the Father of Waters, and thence through 
pine-clad lakes and streams over the divide to Lake Superior; 
and we see this man linking to our Government with ties of 
friendship that ever shall endure the Chippewa Tribes of 
the North, while opening to development a vast lumber in- 
dustry and eventually the greatest iron ore resources of the 
world. 

We see him elected Territorial Delegate of Minnesota to 
the National Capitol, and with Douglas penning the act 
which gave Minnesota its constitution, its boundaries, and its 
sovereign statehood. We see him elected first United States 
Senator of the North Star State, and we see that great trium- 
virate of pioneer statesmanship — General Sibley, Governor 
Ramsey, and Senator RicE — laying that foundation of liberal 
grants of public lands which has made Minnesota one of the 
foremost States in railroad transportation and agriculture, 
and the most richly endowed educational Commonwealth in 
our Union. We see county and lake and city park and street 
named in his honor. We see him appointed president of the 
board of regents of the great State university which his wis- 
dom so richly endowed. We see him elected to the Loyal 
Legion for civic duty in public service. We are with him 
in the hdvir of his death in a distant State, when a message 
of love and brotherhood, and of faith in his final safe voyage 
to a happier land beyond is sent to him by his redskin broth- 
ers from the northern forests of Lake Superior. 

It gives me the greater pleasure to participate in this 
public commemoration here to-day because it was my privi- 
lege as a boy and young man to have met Mr. RicE and to 
have had personal knowledge of his great services. The 
great work he has done for our State comes hometomewith 
special force, because the congressional district which I 
represent, the third Minnesota, was the first home of Mr. 
Rice and was the seat of his early activities. Moreover, 



52 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

nine of the ten counties of the district are carved out of the 
Sioux Indian possessions which through the missionary 
labors of Mr. RicE were ceded to us for settlement; and 
Rice County, to which Mr. RicE gave his name and a valua- 
ble historical library, has always been one of the leading 
counties of the third congressional district. 

Both Senator RicE and General Sibley made their early 
home in Mendota, on the west bank of the Mississippi, in Da- 
kota County ; and at one time it was contemplated to establish 
the Territorial capital at Mendota instead of across the river on . 
the St. Paul side. When Governor Ramsey, the first Territo- 
rial governor, came to Minnesota by appointment of Presi- 
dent Taylor, he likewise made his first home on the Mendota 
side, and on the day he entered upon his executive duties he 
paddled over the river in a birch-bark canoe from the home of 
General Sibley on the Mendota side. History even records 
that were it not for one Joseph Rolette, a member of the Terri- 
torial legislature from Pembina, who stole, or otherwise pur- 
loined in an unparliamentary manner, the Territorial bill 
establishing the State capital, the city of St. Peter, my own 
home, would have been the capital of Minnesota, in which 
the first State legislature would have met to elect Henry 
Mower Rice the first United States Senator from the North 
Star State. 

Our State and our Nation to-day are paying just tribute to 
the memory of this man, who, both by the life he lived and 
by the ancestry he bore, was in every sense of the word 
"nature's nobleman." It is a strange coincidence that, 
just as his life ran 77 years, so the period which has elapsed 
from the day he first reached Fort Snelling on the Minne- 
sota River to the day when we erect this statue to his 
memory is 77 years. What a period these 77 years have 
been in the history of the human race, and how noble has 
been the part which he has had in that history. It has 
taken us 77 years to measure the greatness of this man, but 
the full measure of his service to his country and his fellow 
men shall not be known until the end of time. [Applause.] 



ADDRESS OF MR. STEENERSON OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker, Henry Mower Rice was Delegate in Con- 
gress from the Territory of Minnesota from December 5, 
1853, to March 4, 1857, and the enabling act or act author- 
izing the people of Minnesota to form a State government 
was passed February 26, 1857, six days before the end of 
his term of service as Delegate. The act admitting the 
State into the Union was passed May 11, 1858, and Mr. 
Rice, having already been elected one of the Senators of 
the new State, took his seat in that body the next day, 
May 12, and served to March 4, 1863. 

Mr. Rice was well known and highly respected among the 
various tribes of Indians in the Northwestern country, for 
he had been a trader among them in pioneer days. He 
rendered valuable service in negotiating many of the treaties 
with the Indians whereby large tracts of land were ceded 
to the United States. One of his last public services was 
in the capacity of chairman of the Chippewa Indian Com- 
mission, which successfully negotiated for the cession of 
over 4,000,000 acres from the Chippewas in northern Min- 
nesota under the act of January 14, 1889 (Nelson Act). 
Most of this area is now in my congressional district. 

The State of Minnesota was fortunate in the character 
of its early pioneers. The westward rush of settlers con- 
sequent upon the discovery of gold in California in 1848 
brought quite a tide of immigration to Minnesota. Most 
of these settlers came from the States of the East — Penn- 
sylvania, New York, and New England. They laid the 
foundation of the new Commonwealth deep and broad — 
made liberal provisions for schools, internal improve- 
ments, and State institutions. The public and municipal 
laws were patterned after the most advanced models. The 
New England town organization was embedded in the 
constitution, and to this day the people of the State in 
annual town meetings exercise direct legislative power. 
This has worked so well that the principles of direct popular 

53 



54 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

voice in the making of laws and selection of public servants 
has been extended to the nomination of local, comity, 
district, State, and even National officers by direct pri- 
maries. Om- State was one of the first of the Western 
States to follow the lead of New York in adopting a written 
code not only to govern court procedure but to define 
crimes and civil rights. 

Senator Henry Mower Rice was elected Delegate for the 
Territory of Minnesota in the fall of 1852, and took his seat 
in December, 1853. That year my father moved from 
Wisconsin and settled in Houston County, in the extreme 
southeastern comer of the State, and as he was a Democrat 
imtil the breaking out of the Civil War, I have no doubt he 
voted for Mr. RicE as Delegate at the election of 1854. I 
remember his telling me he voted for Douglas for President 
in i860; but like most of the soldiers at the front he voted 
for Lincoln in 1864. 

I met Senator Rice only once, and I remember him as a 
kindly, affable, and distinguished looking gentleman. I 
had then just located, as a young lawyer, in northern Min- 
nesota, and he was good enough to give me encouragement 
and to speak in enthusiastic terms of the futiue of that 
part of the State. We are told tliat Senator RiCE first 
came to Minnesota in 1839, when only 22 years of age, and 
while there were scarcely any white settlers in the whole 
country. In his business of trading with the Indians he 
must have traveled extensively throughout the whole 
State in those early days. What an interesting sight it 
must have been to view the beautiful landscapes at a time 
when they were in their primeval grandeur and beauty. 
He was a close observer and a business man rather than an 
orator. The work he did in framing the organic act and 
securing liberal land grants for the future State, its schools, 
its highways, and its railroads, shows that he fully realized 
the magnificent future of the new Commonwealth and its 
people. 

The impulse to do something in the world, when strong 
in the human soul, is a mark of greatness. This impulse or 



Address of Mr. Steenerson of Minnesota 55 

creative instinct finds expression and outlet in various 
ways — in public service as civil, militar\% or religious lead- 
ers; in great works of literature or of the fine arts. The 
work of founding a city, a municipality, a State, or a nation 
upon enlightened principles is a most valuable public service 
and one which in its influence for good long endures. This 
impulse was strong in Washington. He not only was the 
father of a new nation, but spent much labor and effort in 
founding in the wilderness the city of Washington, destined 
to become the model and most beautiful city in the world. 
This aspiration and desire to be of public service was strong 
in Senator RicE. Having an intimate knowledge of the 
country in those early days and being able to foresee its 
great future, he was well qualified for the great work of 
state building. No doubt as he traveled through the deep 
forests and verdant plains of northern Minnesota he foresaw 
that it would be the home of a teeming population in the 
not distant future. With prophetic eye he saw the present 
as well as the future, and could with the poet Whittier 
sing— 

I hear the wild Rice-Eater thresh 

The grain he has not sown; 
I see, with flashing scythe of fire, 

The prairie harvest mown! 

I see the swarthy trappers come 

From Mississippi's springs; 
And war-chiefs with their painted brows, 

And crests of eagle wings. 

I hear the tread of pioneers 

Of nations yet to be; 
The first low wash of waves, where soon 

Shall roll a human sea. 

The rudiments of empire here 

Are plastic yet and warm ; 
The chaos of a mighty world 

Is rounding into form! 

Each rude and jostling fragment soon 

Its fitting place shall find — 
The raw material of a State, 

Its muscle, and its mind! 



56 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

Minnesota was indeed fortunate in obtaining the services, 
in the formative period of its history, of such men as Henry 
M. Rice. His character was as white as the marble of 
which his statue is made. He was a good man, and in the 
sense that I have indicated he possessed greatness also. 
It is therefore fitting and proper that the great North Star 
State should honor his memory by placing his statue in this 
sacred Hall. [Applause.] 



ADDRESS OF MR. MILLER OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker, the founder of any institution is always 
the most interesting character ever associated with that 
institution. The builders of a State or a nation always 
occupy in the minds and thoughts of the people who therein 
later dwell perhaps a more important and higher place 
than is accorded to their successors, however great may 
be their deeds. The pioneers of any region are always 
the most distinctive characters that ever enter into the 
history of the region. The pioneers who have builded the 
western part of America are perhaps entitled to the highest 
consideration and tribute of any class of people that have 
ever lived in the world. When we think of the deeds of 
soldiers who have fought for the right on many a field 
since history began, we feel thrilled by their devotion and 
their achievements; but if I read history aright, all the 
deeds that have ever been performed by soldiers, how- 
ever noble, however great, are not equal in importance to 
the redeeming of this great continent by the pioneers of 
America. 

They were an extraordinary lot of men, self-reUant, 
capable, vigorous, determined. Physical courage and moral 
courage aHke animated them throughout the course of their 
lives. Of this class of men Henry M. Rice was a con- 
spicuous member. I can not help but reflect that he was 
bom in Vermont, that Httle but wonderful State. Those 
hills and those mountains whose sturdy strength imparted 
some of their own vigor to their sons and daughters have 
inspired with elevated sentiment and a desire nobly to 
achieve, during the whole subsequent course of their lives, 
all whose childhood dwelt among them. Their strength 
has been the strength of the hills; their purity that of the 
clear sky above. 

57 



58 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

Mr. Rice came westward a young man of 19, and stopped 
first in Michigan. He had been in that region but two years 
when, in 1837, he was selected by that important Common- 
wealth as assistant engineer to locate the Sault Ste. Marie 
Canal. I do not know that the people of that time could 
possibly have foreseen the importance of that location 
to the future. This work, small as it may have been then, 
showed the genius and the touch of the pioneer and the 
statesman. This little canal, then located in part by 
Henry M. Rice, has become the greatest canal for commerce 
in all the world. The achievement of France in digging the 
Suez Canal and of the United States in completing the 
Panama Canal will be great achievements throughout all 
time, but the commerce that either will ever carry is small 
in comparison with the commerce now borne by the Sault 
Ste. Marie. Eighty millions of tons last year spell the 
importance of that little stream of water to American 
commerce. 

Two years later, the spirit of the pioneer still actuating 
him, Mr. RicE moved to the great Northwest, to stop where 
every wise man at that time should have stopped, in what 
is now Minnesota. There is to me something significant 
in the fact that when he started on this journey from Michi- 
gan to the great Northwest there was published by a dis- 
tinguished professor and clergyman of New England a 
book the purport of which was that, after traveUng over 
the great Northwest, consisting mainly of what is now 
Minnesota, he advised liis countrymen that that region 
never could become the permanent habitation of a civilized 
community ; that the rigors of the climate were so great and 
the difficulties of overcoming nature so extensive that it 
never could be an important agricultural section. Never- 
theless, this hardy young man pitched his tent there. 

It is further significant that in 1841 this man, vnth the 
unerring eye and practical knowledge of things as he "found 
tliem, indited what is to my mind a most important com- 
munication. It was addressed to no less a personage than 



Address of Mr. Miller of Minnesota 59 

Henry H. Sibley, one of the great pioneers of the North- 
west. In this letter he said he had decided to pitch liis 
tent and cast his fortunes with the great Northwest section, 
now Minnesota, because in his judgment it was sure to 
become a great agricultural area. It may be interesting 
to note also, Mr. Speaker, that at that time he stood abso- 
sutely alone in his belief. AU of his associates of the time, 
with one exception, Mr. Brown, believed that the area 
could never fittingly be transformed into an agricultural 
region. How interesting now, as we behold the State of 
Minnesota, one of the leading agricultural States of the 
Union, and proudly boasting the title of the "Bread and 
Butter State." This fact is but illustrative of the genius 
of the man. 

He found himself in a region that called for energy, 
strategy, common sense, honesty, and industry. There it 
was that the great battle line existed between the wood 
Indians of the North, the Chippewas, and the fearless riders 
of the plain, the dauntless Sioux. It was his mission to 
become the friend of both of these great elements of Indians. 
It was his mission, in a way, to pave their minds for the 
entrance of the white man to assist them in developing the 
lands. True it is, he came there a business man, represent- 
ing a great fur-trading company, but also true it is that 
he realized the bigger and larger mission he and his other 
pioneers were called upon to perform, and he did it in a way 
second to none. , 

It may be also interesting to know on this occasion that 
he is mainly responsible for the prosperity, at least in the 
early days, of the capital city of our State. His position 
among the pioneers of Iowa, Wisconsin, and Minnesota 
at that time was such that every move he made was looked 
up to and respected. He selected the present site of the 
city of St. Paul as a place in which he should devote liis 
life energies. When he did that St. Paul became the center 
of interest of the people of that region, and as a consequence 
thereof sprang into the lead and has ever since been one 
of the imperial cities of the Mississippi Valley. 



6o Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

Minnesota honors its pioneers. We honor every man who 
labored, built deep and strong the foundations of that Com- 
monwealth. We honor Henry M. Rice because his vision 
was not confined by the narrow horizon of his own State. 
To him the veil was Ufted and he beheld the future in all 
its brighter aspects. He, as an educated man, knew the 
value of institutions of learning, and therefore he gave as 
one of his chief works the grant to the State university of a 
sufficient quantity of public land to insure its stability and 
to provide for its development through the future days. 
He builded perhaps better than he knew, for at that time 
it did not enter into the minds of men that any of the 
land then selected would contain the priceless treasures of 
mineral deposits, but we of this day now know that em- 
bedded in many of these lands are found the richest iron 
mines of the world, and to-day the university of our State 
is blessed with a permanent endowment fund so that in the 
many decades to follow it will be in a financial position 
doubtless stronger than any other institution in America. 

We honor him among the pioneers of his time because he 
recognized the value of railroad building, of road building, 
of communication, and many of the splendid highways of 
commerce now found in the Northwest sprung from the 
magic touch which he gave the situation. We honor him 
because of the stiu^dy manhood and because of the splendid 
citizen quahties he always displayed. He was on the side 
of good government, on the side of igoral life, on the side 
of all the elements that go to make a free people strong 
and enduring. He, however, was no accident. In his 
veins flowed the blood of sterling worth; he was a direct 
lineal descendant of Warren Hastings, the famous governor 
of the English East Indies. The blood that filled his veins 
gave him vigor, strength, coinage, and he is entitled to 
the place we give him here to-day, one of the premier 
positions among the numerous noble and heroic pioneers 
that have builded the great Northwest. [Applause.] 



ADDRESS OF MR. VOLSTEAD OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker, Minnesota has presented to the United 
States and placed in Statuary Hall a statue of Henry M. 
Rice. By that act the State has in a conspicuous manner 
honored the memory of Mr. Rice. The statues of only two 
citizens of any one State can be placed in that Hall. It is 
illustrious company to which our citizen has been elected. 
There are the figures of George Washington, Ethan Allen, 
Samuel Adams, Robert Livingston, Daniel Webster, John 
C. Calhoun, James A. Garfield, Lew Wallace, and others 
equally well known. They make a unique gathering of the 
Nation's great. 

Soldiers and statesmen predominate, but men who oc- 
cupied other positions in life are also represented. In this 
group Robert Fulton sits bent over a model of his steamboat. 
Florida, grateful to Dr. John Gorrie, inventor of artificial 
ice, has placed his statue there. The missionary pioneers 
are represented in the likeness of Marquette. The kindly 
face of Roger Williams, the great apostle of religious toler- 
ance, reminds us of his work. The presence of the sturdy 
figure of Robert E. Lee, the great military genius of the 
Confederacy, testifies to a reunited North and South. The 
only woman whose statue is there is that of Frances E. 
Willard. Her great and noble work justly entitles her to 
that honor. Not far from the statue of Henry M. Rice 
is that of James Shields, placed there by the State of Illinois. 
James Shields was elected Senator of the State of Minne- 
sota at the same time as Mr. RicE. It is rather remarkable 
that the statues of the two first Senators of the State should 
have been placed in this American Valhalla. 

The presence of these statues makes this Hall a shrine 
near which patriotic Americans love to linger. Not only 
does the Hall appeal to us because of the purpose to which 

6i 



62 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

it is dedicated, but also because of the memories that 
cluster about it. It was for many years the Hall of the 
House of Representatives and has often reechoed with the 
earnest appeals of the noted men holding councils there. 
May we not fancy that the spirits of those men linger there 
upon the scene of their struggles; that they are there to 
keep watch over the land they loved so well ? Such fancies, 
though akin to dreams, have their uses. The past, with 
its struggles and triumphs, is a world in which we may 
live. It had its men and women that we may know, love, 
and admire. It is because of that love and admiration 
that we erect statues. They are erected not to please the 
dead but to profit the living. These bronze and marble 
figures bring vividly to mind the character and services of 
the men they represent and plead eloquently for a life of 
useful and patriotic service in emulation of their lives. 

For ages the world's chief occupation was war. The path 
to wealth and station was then over the battle field, but 
civilization has tended to lift from obscurity the man of 
civic virtues and to place him on a footing of equality with 
the warrior and to exalt him to an even higher level. 
Some years ago the people of France were asked to say, 
by their votes who, during the preceding century, was 
their greatest man, and Pasteur, a modest chemist, won 
easily over Napoleon, perhaps the world's greatest military 
genius. The more useful and permanent services rendered 
to humanity by this great scientist outweighed, in their 
judgment, the achievements of the great soldier. 

Henry M. Rice, the man we honor, was not a soldier; 
his life was that of a pathfinder, a pioneer. The serv^ice 
he and his associates rendered in winning Minnesota from a 
wilderness shows what intelligence and enterprise can accom- 
plish. Wealth is not in fertile plains, in magnificent forests, 
or inexhaustible mines, but in the intelligent use of such 
resources. For centiu-ies the skill and industry of the 
farmer had been unknown, in this region no lumberman 
had felled the forest, and no miner dug for liidden wealth. 



Address of Mr. Volstead of Minnesota 63 

With the advent of these men came a sudden change. The 
land that gave but a scant living to bands of a few 
thousand militant red men became rich enough not only 
to feed the millions within its borders but also other millions 
in our own and foreign lands. Instead of want and strife 
and misery came wealth and peace and well-being, with all 
the blessings of civiUzed Ufe. 

In this beneficent transformation Henry M. Rice had a 
leading part, and it is in recognition of the debt we owe to 
him for his share in this work that his statue has been placed 
in Statuary Hall. He was one of a group of strong and 
resom-ceful men that found a land occupied only by a 
few roaming Indians and who in a short decade established 
over it civil government, extinguished nearly all the Indian 
titles, and guided the destinies of the embryo State as it 
grew from a few hundred traders and trappers to a popula- 
tion of hundreds of thousands. They created Territorial, 
State, county, township, and municipal governments; 
established chiirches, schools, colleges, and a university; 
built roads and bridges; found markets and developed 
industrial centers to care for the needs of the settlers. 

As the history of some of these men are intimately inter- 
woven, I may be pardoned for mentioning one or two in 
addition to Henry M. Rice. 

To Gen. Henry H. Sibley is due the credit of having 
secirred a Territorial form of government. Without any 
credentials from any organized form of government, he 
appeared before Congress representing the settlers in that 
part of the Territory of Wisconsin which had been excluded 
from the State when Wisconsin was admitted to the Union 
and asked for a seat as a Delegate from the Territory of 
Wisconsin. This was granted and, as such Delegate, he 
secured the passage, in 1849, of an act creating the Terri- 
tory of Minnesota. That act reserved to the future State 
sections 16 and 36 in each township for school purposes. 
This was twice as much land as had up to that date been 

40277°— S. Doc. 425, W-1 r, 



64 Stattie of Henry Mower Rice 

reserved to any State for that purpose. He also secured 
a reservation of two townships for a State university. 

Henry M. Rice succeeded Mr. Sibley as a Delegate in 
Congress and, in 1857, was instrumental in seciuring the 
passage of an act enabling the Territory to frame a State 
constitution. Tliis act, in addition to the usual grants of 
land to States, gave Miimesota to aid public schools two 
sections in each township and thus made effective the reser- 
vation secured by Mr. Sibley. Mr. RicE, as a Delegate and 
aftenvards as one of the first Senators of the State, was 
successful in passing a nimiber of important acts that 
greatly aided in the rapid development of the State. He 
w^as a leader not only as a Delegate and Senator, but also 
as a private citizen, and contributed much to the develop- 
ment of the State and the city of St. Paul, his home. 

Through the influence and active effort of Gov. Ramsey 
the Sioux Indians entered into treaties by which they 
siurendered title to nearly all of the south half of the State. 
Later the Winnebago and Cliippewa Indians by treaties 
released their title to most of the lands in the north half. 
The influence of Mr. RicE aided very materially in secur- 
ing the treaties from these northern Indians with whom he 
had dealt as an Indian trader. 

No attempt will be made to give even in outline the 
history of either of these men. Suffice it to say that 
Sibley, in addition to his position as Delegate in Con- 
gress, was the first governor of the State and was 
afterwards made the commanding officer of our forces 
in the great Indian outbreak of 1862. For his services 
in that war he was made a brigadier general. Alex- 
ander Ramsey was the first Territorial governor, the 
second State governor, and as such is known as the war 
governor. He was also United States Senator, and under 
President Hayes Secretary of War, and for a short time in 
charge of the Navy Department. In recognition of the 
services rendered by these men, Rice County was named 



Address of Mr. Volstead of Minnesota 65 

for Henry M. Rice, Sibley for Henry H. Sibley, and Ram- 
sey for Alexander Ramsey. 

In honoring Henry M. Rice we are honoring the early 
pioneers, many of whom are still living in different parts 
of the State. A person not familiar with pioneer life 
can know but httle of the dangers and difficulties they 
had to face, can know but little of the characteristics 
developed in the struggle to conquer a new country. It 
requires cotuage and enterprise. It is no easy task to bid 
good-by to home and friends and venture out into a wilder- 
ness there to create anew all the advantages of civilized 
life. It requires patience and perseverance of a very high 
order. Long and weary years must elapse in building a com- 
munity. It requires a spirit of cooperation to organize towns, 
cities, counties, and States; establish schools and churches; 
build roads and provide the other conveniences and neces- 
sities of community life. In this work they were compelled 
to lean upon each other for assistance. Though they lived 
many miles apart they still felt that they were neighbors. 
The prejudice of creed and race was forgotten in the generous 
hospitality that each extended to the other. No pioneer 
refused to shelter the wayfaring or share with him his last 
crust. These men grew strong, resourceful, and self- 
reliant. No matter how discouraging the prospects, no mat- 
ter how humble their huts, they had the vision of the dawning 
of brighter day. These sturdy men built the State; they 
built it not only for themselves but for the future as well. 
We honor them and take pleasure in honoring one of their 
most conspicuous representatives. [Applause.] 



ADDRESS OF MR. SMITH OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker, Minnesota originally was a part of New 
France, and was explored by French fur traders, adven- 
turers, and missionaries. Among the earliest of these were 
Jean Nicolet, Nicholas Perrot, Daniel Greysalon Duluth, 
men of great energy and courage. These cleared and opened 
the way for the pioneers who were to follow. Opportunities 
for profit in the fur trade, the love of adventure, and the 
hope of discovering the northwest passage spurred on the 
youth of New France to penetrate the wilds of the unknown 
Northwest. 

In their wake came the missionaries to teach the savage a 
new conception of the Great Spirit. Chief among these 
early missionaries were Fathers Menard and Allouez. Me- 
nard perished among the savages he sought to save and 
Allouez established a mission as early as 1665 at La Point, 
Lake Superior, where he met not only the Hurons who had 
been driven westward from New York by their powerful 
enemies, the Iroquois, but the Chippewas and Dakotas, who 
inhabited that country, which was soon to become one of the 
greatest Commonwealths of the United States and which 
was then known in song as "Tinted Water," or Minnesota. 

Prof. Kirk says : 

Whether by conquest or ancient heritage, Minnesota was peculiarly the 
land of the Dakotas, in which other tribes mentioned were but the sojourners 
of a day. Nomadic in their habits, yet deeply attached to the land of their 
fathers; passionate in temperament and restive under restraint, they were 
quick to perceive a \vrong; fierce, revengeful, and relentless. Hence bloody 
massacres stand as grewsome sentinels along the course of their whole history. 

In stature they were slight and tall, of Grecian cast of coun- 
tenance. They lived in villages scattered over the State and 
subsisted upon wild rice, com, maple sugar, wild berries, and 
game. Savages as they were when the white man discov- 
ered them, they were not an unhappy people. However, 
66 



Address of Mr. Smith of Minnesota 67 

years of contact with the whites caused them to change their 
mode of living and to depend more or less upon the whites 
for subsistence, and by reason of their dependency were 
easily induced to cede to the whites practically all of their 
valuable lands for a mere pittance, with a jug of rum 
thrown in. 

The voyageurs, the fur traders, and the missionary fathers 
dwelt among these children of the chase for nearly 200 years 
before the pioneer came upon the scene. Many of the 
voyageurs became enamored with the life of the Indians and 
married into and lived with the tribes. 

But upon the arrival of the brave and liberty-loving home 
seekers the old order of things had to give way. The trader 
needed the Indian in his business, but the home seeker 
needed the Indian's land. As a result, the home seeker had 
to make terms with both the Indian and the fur trader. 

Before the advent of the white man the Indian killed only 
such game as he needed for food, and as a result, game re- 
mained plentiful; but all this changed when he killed game 
for barter with the fur trader. 

By the year 1819, the date of the establishment of Fort 
Snelling, the fur trader had about run his course. Therefore 
he had no objection to the home seeker's coming, but rather 
welcomed it. The establishment of Fort Snelling marked a 
new era. The red man's sun set to rise no more. His white 
brother desired his pine forests, his rich and fertile prairies, 
his Father of Waters and all its tributaries, his sparkling 
lakes and their myriad of fish, his rich mines, his beautiful 
simset, balmy breezes, and healthful climate. All were de- 
manded in the name of civilization and the Great Jehovah 
as an abiding place for a race of men, strong of stature, noble, 
generous, and brave by nature. They came to enrich, not 
to impoverish, the Empire. They came to build homes, 
schoolhouses, and churches, and to establish a government 
where justice, liberty, and equality might reign supreme 
under the law. 



68 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

These were the sentiments which impelled and actuated 
our forefathers to brave the trials, hardships, and privations 
of frontier life. Humanity, charity, and brotherly love 
everywhere characterized their conduct in those days of 
struggle and hardship. The stranger or imfortunate was 
welcomed at every fireside. 

In 1849 we find the pioneer organizing and establishing a 
Territorial government; in 1858 assuming the obligations of 
statehood; in 1861 furnishing an army to preserve the Re- 
public; in 1862 battling with the savage Sioux who had com- 
mitted all the crimes and atrocities known to savage warfare, 
and spread death and desolation with the tomahawk and 
torch among the settlers. 

The pages of Minnesota's history are replete with the 
names of men and women who have made large sacrifices 
and rendered great and enduring service to the State. The 
Pond brothers, Riggs, Whipple, Reveoue, Williamson and 
his sister, Sibley, Ramsey, RicE, and Gorman form a galaxy 
of men and women that not only every Minnesotan should 
remember with profound reverence, respect, admiration, 
and gratitude, but to whom every citizen throughout our 
land should do honor for the part they took in founding a 
great Commonwealth, in civilizing and Christianizing the 
Indian, and in preserving the Union of these United States. 

Gov. Ramsey made the first tender of troops to President 
Lincoln on the day that a Confederate cannon in Charleston 
Harbor proclaimed to the world that hitherto friendly and 
loyal people were about to enter into a mighty conflict to 
test the indissolubility of our Government; likewise Henry 
Sibley, during the existence of that mighty civil strife, in 
1862 paralyzed the hand of the savage Sioux, who were 
spreading death and desolation among the frontier settle- 
ments of Minnesota. 

However, much as I desire on all occasions, when the 
history of my State is under consideration, to pay reveren- 
tial respect to all of its founders, I am compelled to refrain 
from doing so, because on this occasion the exercises are in 



Address of Mr. Smith of Minnesota 69 

commemoration of the life and service of only one of Minne- 
sota's most distinguished citizens, the late Hon. Henry 
Mower Rice, by no means the least of the three foremost 
pioneers of the great Northwest, Ramsey, Sibley, and RicE, 
all men of high character and honorable pmposes — states- 
men in the truest sense of the word — each \^ing with the 
other to render service to the pioneer settlers of Minnesota, 
as well as to the Nation. 

Dr. William Watts Folwell, one of Minnesota's noted 
historians, said: 

Mr. Rice's personal qualities were such that he could not help desiring 
public employment and obtaining great success in it. His manners were so 
gracious, and yet not patronizing, that he made friends with all sorts and 
conditions of men. He divined with imerring instinct the motives of men 
and parties, and knew when and how by appropriate suggestion to lead them 
apparently to move themselves to his desired ends. 

The gracious characteristics that Dr. Folwell speaks of 
made Mr. RicE one of America's most popular men. 

Bom in Waitsfield, Vt., November 29, 181 7, he spent the 
greater part of his life at St. Paul, Minn., engaged in large 
undertakings and outlining broad governmental policies for 
his adopted State. He died, honored and lamented, Janu- 
ary 15, 1894. 

He first became known to fame in the location of the 
Sault Ste. Marie Canal and other public works authorized 
by the State of Michigan. 

In 1839 he settled at Fort Snelling as public attache of 
the settler's department of the post, and soon afterwards 
moved to St. Paul and became a partner in the firm of 
Chouteau & Co., of St. I/Ouis, who took over the business of 
the American Fin- Co. This brought him in contact with 
the Chippewa and Winnebago Tribes of Indians, and by 
coiu-age, coolness, fairness, and tact came in time to exert 
a remarkable influence over these tribes. 

In 1846 the Winnebagoes exhibited their confidence in 
Mr. Rice by making him a delegate, in lieu of their native 
chief, to represent them in the sale of their reservation in 
Iowa to the United States. 



yo Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

Mr. Rice not only negotiated a useful treaty on this occa- 
sion, but diu-ing succeeding years, mainly as commissioner, 
in 1847 to 1889, aided materially in securing accession to 
the United States of Sioux, Chippewa, and other lands, 
covering the greater part of Minnesota. 

Mr. Rice always retained the confidence and affection of 
the Chippewa Tribe of Indians. He was called by them 
Wab-bee-mah-no-min, or White Rice. 

The St. Paul Dispatch, in an editorial commenting upon 
Mr. Rice's commission of 1889, received from President 
Cleveland, had this to say: 

For the successful conduct of these negotiations the chief, if not the entire, 
credit is due the Hon. Henry Mower Rice. His selection as one of the 
commissioners is the wisest possible choice which could have been made. 
It is a singular coincidence that exactly the same day of the same month 42 
years ago, August 27, 1847, Mr. Rice succeeded in successfully concluding 
a treaty with the same band ceding valuable lands to the people. His covu-- 
age and experience, combined with his intimate knowledge of Indian charac- 
ter, enabled him to carry through an undertaking attended by difficulty 
which amounted to serious danger of bloodshed. 

The Democrats of the Territory, recognizing his ability, 
sent him to Congress in 1853, and reelected him in 1855, 
and as a recognition of his services in procuring the pas- 
sage of an act authorizing the admission of Minnesota to the 
Union elected him to the United States Senate in 1857. 

While in the Senate he labored arduously to avert a conflict 
of arms, but when his labors failed he displayed uncom- 
promising loyalty to the Union and rendered distinguished 
service as Senator in the preservation of the Union during 
the trying days of the rebellion. His kindness to the vol- 
unteer soldier will never be forgotten while a Minnesota 
veteran lives to tell the tale. After his retirement from the 
Senate he became treasurer of Ramsey County for three 
successive terms. His work in this office was of the same 
high character that distinguished him in every other posi- 
tion of trust and honor which he occupied. 

While Mr. RicE gave freely of his time to matters of State, 
nevertheless he had an eye for business and was quite as suc- 
cessful in the commercial world as in the political. At one 



Address of Mr. Smith of Minnesota 71 

time he o\vned 80 acres of land in the heart of the city of St. 
Paul upon which streets and blocks were laid out, ware- 
houses, hotels, stores, and residences were built, and sites 
for churches, schools, hospitals, and parks were donated by 
him to the city. He was in a large sense one of the leaders 
in founding the city of St. Paul. His holdings came to be 
worth millions. 

He and three other Minnesotans were the incorporators 
of the Northern Pacific Railway. He gave freely of his 
money. His purse was always open to both public and pri- 
vate needs. No man looked to him in vain for assistance. 
His preeminent characteristics were generosity, affability, 
and love cff mankind. This trinity of ennobling traits made 
men love, respect, and follow him. All sorts and conditions 
of men paid him homage. He mingled with the savage 
Sioux chiefs with the same kingly bearing that won him the 
confidence and lasting friendship of such distinguished 
statesmen as John C. Breckinridge, Robert Toombs, Stephen 
A. Douglas, and many other public men of his day. 

The exigencies of every great occasion bring forth a genius 
to lead men out of darkness into light. 

The present European war will continue tmtil some master 
mind appears capable of penetrating the dense and horrible 
war cloud that for months has settled down upon the un- 
happ}^ people of Evtrope. Not until the arrival of such a 
man will peace be restored to oiu" brothers across the sea. 

Minnesota was fortunate, indeed, in having so wise and 
patriotic a hand as that of Henry Mower Rice to guide and 
protect her people in the formative period of her history, 
and the aborigine, on the dawn of the white man's day in 
Minnesota, was especially favored in having in a position 
of power and influence a white brother with a heart so big 
that it took in all mankind in its love and soUcitude for the 
human family. 



72 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

The State of Minnesota gave public acknowledgment of its 
debt of gratitude to Mr. RicE by adopting the following 
resolution on April 1 1 , 1 899 : 

■Whereas, by act of Congress approved July 2, 1864, provision was made for 
placing in the National Gallery of Statuary, in the Capitol at Washington, 
by each State, of the statues of two of its deceased citizens, illustrious for 
their historic reno«-n or for distinguished civic or military services; and 

Whereas the Hon. Henry M. Rice was, from the year 1846, in which he nego- 
tiated a treaty by which a large portion of the territory now comprising 
the State of Minnesota was acquired from the aborigines, until his death 
preeminent in its service in the positions of Territorial Delegate, first 
United States Senator, and many other distinguished and useful capaci- 
ties, as to entitle him to the commemoration provided for in said act: 
Therefore 
Resolved by the senate (the house of representatives concurring), That the 

said Henry M. Rice be, and he is hereby, designated as one of the persons to 

be thus honored, and that a suitable statue to represent him be placed by the 

State in said National Gallery. 

The imposing statue of the Hon. Henry Mower Rice 
recently erected in the National Gallery of Statuary in this 
Capitol of these United States has been in response to the 
request of the citizens of Minnesota as expressed in the 
above resolution. [Applause.] 



ADDRESS OF MR. LINDBERGH OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker, it is fitting that the legislative representa- 
tives of the people of the State of Minnesota deem it proper 
to honor the memory of a man of the pioneer type in plac- 
ing the statue of Henry M. Rice in the Capitol of the 
Nation, placing his life, his character, and his work before 
the people of the Nation as typical of the men of whom 
Minnesota is proud. Flourishing now and one of the most 
prosperous of the Union, Minnesota recalls the memory of 
her first citizens with sincere feelings of love and respect. 
She is proud of their work ; proud of her development under 
their toil. Henry M. Rice was a leader among the first 
citizens of Minnesota, and in placing his statue in the Hall 
of Fame the State is not only immortalizing his life and his 
work, but is placing before the generations to come proof 
of her regard for the men who first sealed their fate with 
hers. A tribute to his memory is a tribute to the memory 
of every man and woman among his coworkers. 

Fifth in line of descent from Pilgrim ancestors, Henry 
M. Rice, upon reaching early manhood, " struck for the new 
frontier" to win name and honor for himself and to assist 
in the work of laying the foundation stone of a State des- 
tined eventually to take a place among the foremost of the 
sisterhood of the Union. He first entered the military 
establishment at Fort Snelling, and later engaged in fur 
trading for several years. In this work he was constantly 
in close touch with nature, and he soon learned to love the 
beauties of the land about him, the lakes of sky-blue water, 
the rolling prairies, the dense forests of stalwart pines, the 
beauties of springtime, and the fascination of the snow- 
white winters. He saw opportunity on every side and 
pictured the future of this great State. He felt the call of 
an unclaimed land awaiting the hand of the toiler and ready 

73 



74 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

to respond generously to his eflforts. He pictured the future 
of the great Commonwealth to develop under the hand of 
the settler, and his efforts were constantly directed toward 
the development of the State. 

A strong personahty, a gracious manner, courteous at all 
times, and possessed of an instinctive knowledge of the 
wishes of men and parties, Henry M. Rice was qualified for 
public life. Public-spirited to an extreme degree, he partici- 
pated actively in all movements for the development of his 
home — St. Paul — and through his energy and enthusiasm 
won for himself the loyal support of his fellow citizens. 

His labors, however, were not confined to his home city. 
His influence extended into all State matters and his early 
training gave him an insight into the needs and necessities 
of the country and the traits and character of the Indians 
with whom it was necessary to deal, which aided him mate- 
rially in his later public life. His first work was done 
among the Indians. Fearless in battle and quick to resent 
the intrusion of the white man upon their domain, the 
Indians of Minnesota could be dealt with only as man to 
man, and to Henry M. Rice must be given much of the 
credit due for the treaties with the Chippewas and Sioux 
which opened up the fertile fields of Minnesota to the white 
settlers and made possible the development of the great 
lumber industries of the State. 

In 1853 Mr. Rice took his seat as Delegate to Congress, 
and his industry, persuasiveness, and strong personality 
soon placed him in a position of influence. His activity in 
securing land surveys, land oflices, post offices, and the 
opening of lands to settlement won for him a popularity 
hardly equaled in Minnesota history. When the time came 
for Minnesota to seek admission as a State imit, Mr. Rice 
was very active in securing the passage of the act which 
authorized the framing of the State constitution. When 
the State was finally admitted, he was rewarded for his 
efforts in the interests of his State by being elected one of 
the first of Minnesota's United States Senators. In this 



Address of Mr. Lindbergh of Minnesota 75 

capacity he was equally energetic in the interests of his 
State. 

Minnesota is grateful for the work of her pioneers. She 
wishes the Nation to know and she wishes posterity to know 
her appreciation of their efforts. Each State is allowed, 
imder the law, to honor the memory of two most prominent 
sons by placing their statues in the Hall of Fame. In mak- 
ing her first selection Minnesota has chosen from the ranks 
of the men to whom she is most deeply indebted. She has 
chosen a man who was among the first of those who placed 
their lives and their futures in Minnesota and who gave the 
best of their lives to her development. As the years pass 
by, thousands of citizens will visit the Hall of Fame and 
look upon the statues of the Nation's builders. Among 
them will be the stalwart figure of Henry M. Rice, chosen 
from among the first of Minnesota's citizens to typify the 
life, character, ambitions, and work of pioneer Minnesota. 
The son or daughter of Minnesota who sees his statue there 
will see beside him the phantom forms of Alexander Ramsey, 
Henry Hastings Sibley, and their sturdy coworkers, all 
striving to speed the day when their chosen State would 
take the place which they knew in their hearts she must 
inevitably win. The statue of Henry Mower Rice is a 
tribute to his memory, a memorial to the history of Minne- 
sota, and will serve as an inspiration to the young men and 
women who in the years to come will carry on her work. 
[Applause.] 



ADDRESS OF MR. VAN DYKE OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker, the life and the works of a man are his monu- 
ment. The marble which we erect is the expression of pub- 
lic sentiment. The statue which the Nation has placed in 
Statuary Hall is piu-suant to the memorial of the people of 
Minnesota, expressed in the resolution of the State Legis- 
latiue of Minnesota in 1899, five years after his death, 
praying the Federal Government of the United States to 
erect in honor of Henry Mower Rice a statue in recogni- 
tion of his great public ser\nces to the State and Nation. 

The people of Minnesota had already in many practical 
ways given evidence of their faith and expressed public recog- 
nition of his ser\'ices by electing him twice Delegate of their 
Territory', the first Senator from Minnesota in the United 
States Senate, a member of the board of regents of the State 
university, and by naming in his honor the counties of 
Mower and of Rice. The people of St. Paul, of which he was 
one of the chief founders, required his public ser\-ices for 
three terms as city treasurer and elected him president of 
the board of public works and president of the chamber of 
commerce, while the old settlers and the soldiers of Minne- 
sota had elected him president of the Old Settlers' Associa- 
tion and a member of the Loyal Legion. 

Historians of family ancestr}' trace the lineage of Henry 
^L Rice back through the centuries to days when lord and 
knight held sway by greatness of arm and heart and the 
power of leadership. But the plain and humble democracy 
of this man is disclosed by the fact that when he came to 
Minnesota through the wilderness from upper Michigan he 
came with his pack on his back, having traveled the first 200 
miles of his jomney on foot. 

He reached Fort Snelling, on the upper Mississippi, in 
1839, just two hundred years after Edmund Rice, his Pil- 
grim ancestor, landed on the bleak coast of New England. 
76 



Address of Mr. Van Dyke of Minnesota 77 

On the side of both father and mother his ancestors had been 
soldiers of the American Revolution and had done loyal 
service in the French and Indian Wars. Five generations 
of selectmen, soldiers, deacons, justices of the peace, tillers 
of the soil, and pathfinders in the pioneer struggles for Amer- 
ican existence and freedom had laid the foundations of his 
character, and to this he added the knowledge obtained in 
the public schools, the academy, and the study of law and 
siuveying. 

We of Minnesota and the Lake Superior region to-day 
boast, as the evidence of the greatness of our resom-ces and 
of our industrial and commercial development, that the 
commerce of the Great Lakes which passes through Sault 
Ste. Marie Canal has over three times the tonnage of that 
which passes through the Suez Canal in the ocean commerce 
between Europe and Asia, and that the Great Lakes fleet 
passing through our northern canal is the greatest raerchant 
fleet which bears the American flag. It is of special inter- 
est, therefore, for us to take note, as we dedicate this statue 
to this man, that it was Henry M. Rice, the young sur- 
veyor of 1835, who made the first survey of the Sault Ste. 
Marie Canal for the State of Michigan, and that it was 
Henry M. Rice, the Indian-treaty maker of the forties and 
fifties and thereafter, who opened to white settlement the 
wheat lands, the pine forests, and iron ranges which fimiish 
the bulk of the tonnage which has brought fame to the com- 
merce of the "Soo" Canal and Great Lakes and prosperity 
to the industries of Minnesota and the entire upper Missis- 
sippi Valley. 

His life in the pioneer wilderness of the Northwest — Army 
sutler at Fort Snelling and Fort Atkinson, chief fur trader 
among the tribes of the Winnebagoes and Chippewas, sur- 
veyor and founder of settlements, friend and coworker of 
both white settlers and Indian trappers, versed in wood lore 
and Indian lore, as familiar with the life and languages of the 
Sioux and Chippewas as with those of the New Englander 



78 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

and European immigrant — gave him that thoroughly prac- 
tical grasp, that intimate understanding of men and mo- 
tives, that sympathy with and knowledge of pioneer and 
primitive conditions which made him perhaps the most suc- 
cessful Indian-treaty maker our country has known. 

The Winnebagoes made him their representative in Wash- 
ington for the sale of their lands and the signing of their 
reserv^ation treaties. The Sioux negotiated their treaties 
through him, after all previous efforts had resulted in failure. 
The first treaty which the Chippewas of Minnesota nego- 
tiated with the United States through the missionary efforts 
of Henry M. Rice was on August 22, 1847, and the last was 
on August 22, 1889 — just 42 years to a day — and though the 
several Chippewa treaties gave Minnesota nearly two-fifths 
of its territory, the great forest and iron-ore section of its 
northern domain, he held their friendship and their loyalty 
to the white race and the Government to the end. 

The Chippewas knew Henry M. Rice as " Wab-bee-mah- 
no-min," or "White Rice. " Though he died in San An- 
tonio, Tex., 2,000 miles away, the Chippewa Tribe joined in 
sending him, at the time of his death in 1894, their message 
of love and brotherhood. Judge Flandreau, one of the 
pioneer members of the supreme bench of Minnesota, testi- 
fies that — 

Until the day of his death there was bo other white man in Minnesota who 
had the confidence and affection of the Chippewa Tribes to anything like the 
same extent as Mr. RicE. 

One of the reasons for this confidence and affection was 
that Henry M. Rice looked upon the Indian not as an 
alternate object of public charity and private exploitation 
but as a man and brother entitled to plain justice. His 
ambition was to make the Indian a self-supporting citizen. 
In the State of Minnesota, which is larger than New Eng- 
land, and in the Territory of Minnesota, which at that time 
comprised a domain equal to New England and the Middle 
States, he believed there was room enough and land enough, 
if wisely and justly divided, to accommodate both the scat- 



Address of Mr. Van Dyke of Minnesota 79 

tered Indian bands and a large white population. He pro- 
tected the Indians from aggression by setting aside for them 
extensive reservations, provided with schools and indus- 
trial facilities and exempt from whisky and taxation. The 
greed of men has in part defeated his statesmanlike pur- 
pose, and yet the progress that is now being made shows 
that his faith was not misplaced and that his dream may 
yet come true. 

The benefits of Mr. Rice's Indian treaties to the white 
race are beyond the scope of this occasion to describe. The 
20,000,000 acres which he was instrumental in securing by 
negotiation from the Sioux became the foundation of the 
great spring-wheat industry which has made the country 
west of the upper Mississippi famous as the leading bread- 
producing district of the world. The forests of pine and 
spruce obtained from the Chippewas have given Minnesota 
leadership in the production of white-pine lumber and news 
print paper. The three iron ranges of northern Minnesota, 
located in the old hunting and trapping haunts of the Chip- 
pewas, produce three-fourths of the iron ore of the United 
States and one-fifth that of the world. 

Associated with Henry H. Sibley, Mr. RicE aided in the 
organization of the Territory of Minnesota in 1849, and in 
1853 and 1855 was elected as Territorial Delegate to Wash- 
ington. It was in that capacity that he secured in behalf 
of Minnesota settlers the priority right to preemption of 
unsurveyed lands as against purchase by speculators. It 
was as Territorial Delegate, moreover, that he secured, 
through the cooperation of Senator Stephen A. Douglas, 
the adoption of the act authorizing the people of Minne- 
sota to frame a constitution preparatory to admission to 
the Union. Through this initiative of Mr. RicE Minnesota 
was admitted to statehood May 11, 1858, and the people, 
in prompt recognition of this servace, elected him as their 
first representative in the United States Senate. 

As Territorial Delegate and as Senator Henry M. RicE 
was recognized as the strong influence in Washington for 
40277°— S. Doc. 425, 64-1 6 



8o Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

Minnesota development. He secured the first land offices 
and post offices, the postal routes and railways, the military 
roads, and all other Federal establishments. As Senator 
he held the important committeeships of Public Lands and 
Indian Affairs, Post Offices and Post Roads, and both 
Military and Finance. 

It was in the midst of his term as Senator that the Civil 
War broke out between North and South. Doing all in his 
power to avert such calamity, he thereafter became an 
uncompromising supporter of the cause of the Union. A 
northern Democrat, he loyally supported President Lincoln. 
As a member of the Senate Military and Finance Commit- 
tees he was in a position to render signal service to the 
administration in its trying hours. Of the knowledge dis- 
played by him in Army affairs. Senator Henry Wilson, of 
Massachusetts, chairman of the Senate Committee on Mili- 
tary Affairs, stated that Senator Rice's practical aid "was 
of greater service to the country than that of all other 
members of the committee." 

On the question of slavery Senator RiCE held to the true 
Democratic principle which prevailed through the North- 
western Territories from the adoption of the ordinance of 
1787: "I am opposed to slavery for the reason that I am 
in favor of the largest human liberty." Just as he refused 
to desert the cause of the Union and of human liberty 
when so many Democratic States in the South joined in 
rebellion, he refused likewise to desert his Democratic 
principles and join the Republican party when nearly all of 
Minnesota deserted and all public positions were open to 
him as the price of such desertion. He stood steadfast to 
the principles as he saw them in the light of his reason, his 
conscience, and his knowledge of American constitutional 
history throughout the 77 years of his life. 

His place as one of the chief founders of the city of St. 
Paul, the State capital of Minnesota, rests upon a broad 
foundation. The 80 acres wliich he bought on the east 
bank of the Mississippi as early as 1 848 are in the heart of 



Address of Mr. Van Dyke of Minnesota 8i 

the present city, and are known on the city plat as the 
"Rice & Irvine addition." With characteristic enter- 
prise and liberality, he undertook the early development of 
the city by laying out streets and blocks and donating sites 
to churches, schools, hospitals, and parks. At the comer 
of Third and Washington Streets he built the second brick 
house erected in Minnesota. Rice Park, Rice Street, and 
Rice Lake still bear his name; and his pubUc services and 
public donations to the development of his home city are a 
part of the history of the State and its capital. 

It is in recognition of this vast pubUc service, it is in 
memory of this strong and lovable character, it is in honor 
of this broad-minded and pubUc-spirited statesman, it is 
in tribute to this high purpose and far \4sion of the prophet 
pioneer that our State and Nation to-day erect this statue 
to Henry Mower Rice. It takes time to bring out in bold 
relief upon the scroll of history the silhouette of a great 
character. On November 29 of next year will fall the 
centennial anniversary of this man's birth. It has been a 
century of the greatest progress of the world in all that 
has made for the freedom, the prosperity, and the uplift of 
the common man and in the opening of the frontiers and 
the waste places of the earth for the homes of men, and in 
this vast work Henry M. Rice has borne the true noble- 
man's part. In his life as citizen and hardy pioneer, in 
the hardships which he has shared with the humble settler 
and Indian, in the helpfulness he has shown to his fellow 
men and the wise provisions he has made for the generations 
to come, as in the abiUty of his career as a statesman and 
the loyalty of his devotion to the principles of his country, 
he has proved himself a worthy scion of a splendid lineage, 
whom we do well to honor. [Applause.] 



ADDRESS OF MR. SCHALL OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker, 77 years ago, a man of 23, all his worldly 
goods in a pack upon his back, but in his heart the wealth 
and courage and faith of youth, stood upon the banks of the 
Mississippi, contemplating the Falls of St. Anthony. 

Behind him was the birch-bark hut of the fur trader and a 
few skin wigwams, while about him was the spell of the 
"forest primeval," where "the murmuring pines and the 
hemlocks stood like harpers hoar." 

Under tlie witchery of the solitude, intensified by the rustle 
of the leaves and tlie swirl of the waters, his prophetic mind 
was projected into the future, and he saw as we see to-day. 

Up and down along the river the Twin Cities stretched with 
their 700,000 souls. He felt the might of the water rushing 
over the falls, and above its soimd caught the roar of the 
mill wheels grinding the flour for one-fifth of mankind. He 
saw the giant pines float down on the bosom of the river 
in great convoys to the lumber center, and looking a little to 
the south he saw on a bluff, rising abruptly from the water's 
edge, the University of Minnesota, with which his name was 
destined to be linked as one of the founders and regents, and 
whose student em-ollment to-day is 9,000. 

Great buildings reared their massive structiu-e; towers, 
domes, and spires pierced the sky. Numerous bridges 
spanned the river;* varied industry breatlied through a thou- 
sand factory chimneys, feeding and clothing and housing the 
great Middle West. 

God set tlie panorama, placed materials and fertile soil, 
gave indulgent summers and bracing winters. Here was 
everytliing ready for the hand, the head, and the heart of 
man. What a country, if only the arteries of roads could 
connect it with civilization. Industry and capital would 
82 



Address of Mr. Schall of Minnesota 83 

make an enduring and mighty reality. Here was work for 
men. His task was plain, and he set about to accomplish 
his vision. 

This man typifies the great builders of our Nation, whose 
intelligence, courage, endurance, and energy wrested from 
natiure supremacy. His success we are to-day met to com- 
memorate, "bringing our robin's leaf to deck" his memory. 
The name of Henry M. Rice is inseparable from the prog- 
ress, the development, the history of Minnesota. His force 
of character, industry, and shrewdness guided the infant 
State. To-day our broad plains and sunny vales are dotted 
with prosperous and happy homes; and to the grateful 
millions yet to come, because this man and his type lived 
and wrought, the North Star State is the promised land. 
[Applause.] 



ADDRESS OF MR. ANDERSON OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker, I had not thought until to-day to say 
anything upon this occasion, but that which has already 
been said inspires me to say just a word or two in regard 
to the spirit and philosophy of the exercises in which we are 
now engaged. 

In that building, which seems to me to exemplify more 
than any other the genius and the purpose of the American 
people, the Library of Congress, there is a series of mural 
paintings illustrating the efforts of mankind to preserve 
and transmit to posterity that which is notable and worthy 
in its peculiar age and generation. The first picture is 
that of the cave man, as, with strong hands, he piles together 
the imchiseled stone to commemorate some event that to 
him is notable. The second is that of the old man of the 
tribe, as, with crude eloquence, he tells the story to the 
young men of the bravery of his tribe and the glory of 
its traditions. The third is that of the naked savage, who, 
with crude and unsharpened chisel, engraves upon the 
stone wall the hieroglyphics that tell the tale of his people. 
The fourth is that of the red man, as he paints with ink the 
pictograph of some famous chase, of some immortal battle. 
The fifth is that of the monk, as he sits in his silent cell and, 
with quill pen, writes indelibly upon the parchment the 
sacred and imperishable truths of religion; and the last 
is that of the printing press. 

To-day we, as it were, add another, but a word picture, 
that will serve to keep green the memory of the achieve- 
ments of one of the pioneers of Minnesota, Henry M. Rice. 

We are endeavoring by these exercises to erect and, in a 
sense, dedicate a monument to one whose achievements 
in the infancy of otir State will he an inspiration to all who 
84 



Address of Mr. Anderson of Minnesota 85 

look upon his face in the Hall of Fame. Mr. Speaker, there 
is a legend of ancient Greece that tells us of a game in the 
natture of a relay race. In this game only the strong, the 
young, and the fleet were permitted to take part. They 
chose sides, and each side tried with all its might to carry 
one to the other a blazing torch from the starting point 
to the goal. Henry M. Rice carried the torch of progress 
and of civilization in the rugged period of Minnesota's his- 
tory when the foundations of its greatness were being laid. 
His services have added luster to its flame and distance to 
its goal. 



ADDRESS OF MR. ELLSWORTH OF MINNESOTA 

Mr. Speaker and gentlemen of the House, three genera- 
tions ago the men in the more thickly settled portions of 
the East saw in the expanding territories of the West oppor- 
tmiity. Men in those days lived by a different rule from that 
by wliich we live to-day. We now ask ourselves, Where can 
we go and do the best, or where can we go and get the most 
with the least effort? In those days men looking to the 
West, to the frontier of the coimtry, used to ask themselves 
the question, Where can we go to become the most useful as 
citizens to the people with whom we are associated in our 
daily lives and make of ourselves the most? I picture 
St. Paul in the forties. I picture to myself the side-wheeler 
coming up the Mississippi River. I picture to myself that 
famous hostelry, like the old Fifth Avenue Hotel, where 
governors and Senators were made and immade at the be- 
hest of men who ruled the destinies of politics, the Mer- 
chants Hotel. In 1849 when Alexander Ramsey, holding 
his commission from President Taylor, by way of the side- 
wheeler steamboat route landed at St. Paul and went up 
to the Merchants Hotel he then foimd the proprietor, a 
Mr. Bass, remodeling, fixing over in two rooms what had 
formerly been one, because the Territory of Minnesota had 
been admitted to the Union, and increased business was 
expected. He went across the street and found another 
building being remodeled, and learned from an onlooker 
that the other building was the governor's mansion. He 
did not like the outlook and took a ship down to Mendota, 
where he found H. H. Sibley, then a Delegate of the Terri- 
tory in Congress. He and Sibley the next morning, after 
staying all night at Sibley's house, came back to St. Paul on 
horseback and laid the foundation of that great empire of 
86 



Address of Mr. Ellsworth of Minnesota 87 

the West so soon to become a State, first a Territory and 
then the State of Minnesota. 

I picture to myself the stores, the buildings in the then 
little village of St. Paul. Picture to yourself a building, 
partly log, partly frame, with one-third pitched roof and 
little porticos or porches or verandas out in front, like the 
little store in the time of Lincoln at Springfield. Picture 
to yourselves the men with black slouched hats, negligee 
shirts, frock coats, trousers baggy, large, generous, cut at 
the bottom like a sack, and high-top boots. And in those 
crude half-homespun jackets, and those crude homespun 
trousers and shirts, and under those slouched hats, men had 
gone out from the East, young men from 20 to 35 years of 
age, bringing the culture of the academies of the East to 
help build up the great Middle West. There were three 
such pioneers: Sibley, the first governor of the State; 
Ramsey, the first governor of the Territory; and Henry 
Mower Rice, one of the first United States Senators from 
the State after its organization. 

All were typical of the civilization, of the spirit of the 
times, and of the locality in which they lived and became 
a part. But there was some difference. I have heard 
the question asked, and a proper question, too, since the 
erection of the statue in Statuary Hall of the man whose 
name we honor to-day, why he had been selected for this 
honor rather than perhaps one of the others, such as Sibley 
or Ramsey, either one of whom might properly also have 
been selected. I take it that it is .the spirit of this occasion, 
that it is a proper function of such a memorial, that it may 
not only commemorate the man but commemorate the 
time and locality, commemorate the activity of the city and 
State in which he lived, and commemorate at the same 
time the type of the sturdy pioneer who helped to build up 
that empire of the West. 

But there is a distinction. There is a special reason why 
Henry Mower Rice and not Alexander Ramsey and not 
Henry H. Sibley should have been selected. There is a 



88 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

reason why the selection of Henry Mower Rice is eminently 
a proper selection. Ramsey came to Minnesota, then a 
Territory, with a commission from the President of the 
United States in his pocket as governor of the new Terri- 
tory — not that that should detract from the useful life 
which he afterwards lived; not that that should mean for 
one moment that the spirit, that the activities into which 
he molded himself in his after career in the making of 
that great State, should in any way be detracted from, but 
it was different from the way in which ovu" hero came to the 
State. Rice, a youngster of 22, imbued with the spirit of 
adventure; Ramsey, a former Member of Congress, who in 
1846 sat in this body, which held its sessions in the old 
Chamber in this building. Ramsey was an entirely different 
type of man. Of Sibley I may say the same thing. Sibley 
came representing a great fur-trading business, the Ameri- 
can Fur Co., of which John Jacob Astor was the president. 
He came under the auspices and with the backing of the 
wealth of the East, while Ramsey, who had been an attor- 
ney in Pennsylvania and a Member of the House of Repre- 
sentatives, came with the backing of political prestige. They 
helped to build up Minnesota. They, together with our 
hero in this case, Henry Mower Rice, helped to lay the 
foundation of the Territory and of the State, but the State 
and its people did not mold them to the same extent, and 
while they may have themselves developed Minnesota — all 
of them — it may be said, I think, that Minnesota and the 
stirring scenes of the early days did, in fact, peculiarly 
develop Henry Mower Rice and made him the distinct 
type of the time and generation in which he lived. 

But I think there is another reason, and to my mind the 
controlling reason, after all, why, when we sift out the 
result, and get the sum total of human affairs, we find 
that certain things are done in certain ways. There is a. 
reason why it was eminently fitting, why it was not only 
fitting but inevitable, that Henry Mower Rice should 



Address of Mr. Ellsworth of Minnesota 89 

have been chosen by those who formerly knew him to 
adorn the niche assigned to om- fair State in the Hall of 
Fame. He was the Indians' friend. He was a kindly 
man. He was a man who, when old Joe Rolette, whom 
one of my colleagues, I think Mr. Davis, referred to, stole 
the bill which kept St. Peter from becoming the capital 
of the State, would come to town — he was a French Canadian 
and in his county in the northern part of the State used to 
wear the Indian garb — and would go to a fashionable 
tailoring shop and buy himself a full complement of up-to- 
date clothes and would say to the tailor, "Charge it to 
Mr. Rice " — would, without prearrangement or notice 
beforehand, pay the bill because Joe Rolette was his friend. 
He was the kind of a man who, when he had his first cam- 
paign for governor, and I believe the only campaign for 
governor, after he had been in Congress, running against 
Gov. Marshall, who had the Republican nomination, and 
they had agreed upon a division of time in what they 
thought would be a forensic tour about the State, urging 
their claims for votes, and after the time had been divided 
twice on each side, making about 3 hours of division of 
time, got upon the platform and in 1 5 minutes finished his 
speech by saying that the people ought to elect Marshall; 
that Marshall was the sturdy pioneer who was entitled to 
become the governor of the State — and then finished the 
debate. 

Once in the United States Senate he again showed his 
kindness when Senators Fessenden and Dixon got into a 
confab. He addressed the President of the Senate, and 
pleaded that such confabs be not had; that they formed a 
bad example for the younger Members of the Senate, and 
stated that he did not believe anything was to be gained 
from ill will, and hoped it would not happen again. 

Again, when there was applause on one occasion in the 
galleries of the Senate, when some speaker other than 
himself — for he very seldom spoke — insisted that the gal- 



'% 

^t,' 



90 Statue of Henry Mower Rice 

leries be cleared, he pleaded with the presiding ofl&cer not 
to clear them. 

It was this trait of his character, the kindly spirit, the 
large-hearted and generous disposition toward those who 
honored and revered his memory, that was a great factor in 
the fitting selection made, and I believe Minnesota shall 
always enjoy a just pride in his name and memory and the 
fitting tribute paid to his sterling worth and type. [Ap- 
plause.] 

The Speaker pro tempore. The question is on the adop- 
tion of the concurrent resolution. 

The concurrent resolution was agreed to. 

ADJOURNMENT 

Mr. Rainey. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now 
adjourn. 

Mr. Austin. Mr. Speaker, I move that we adjourn until 
Monday at 12 o'clock. 

The Speaker pro tempore. The motion is made that the 
House do now adjourn until Monday at 12 o'clock. 

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 5 o'clock and 
57 minutes p. m.) the House adjourned until Monday, 
March 13, 1916, at 12 o'clock noon. 



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